Rinderpest, the Cattle-Killing Plague, to Become the Second Officially-Eradicated Scourge
The Death of a Disease PixelgardenThe UN will formally announce the triumph this summer The plague begins with a fever, weepy eyes and a drippy muzzle. Dysentery and diarrhea follow, and then death by dehydration. Rinderpest sweeps through a herd quickly, and can kill half its animals in a matter of weeks. The loss of thousands or even tens of thousands of cattle can devastate a community. An outbreak in 1889 killed enough of Ethiopia's livestock that the ensuing famine caused a third of the country to starve to death. But this summer, the Food and Agriculture Organization of the United Nations plans to formally announce rinderpest's eradication, making it the second scourge, after smallpox, to be intentionally wiped off the face of the Earth. Rinderpest arrived alongside the domestication of cattle, in the Indus River valley about 10,000 years ago. It traveled west out of Asia with the Huns and...