Technological Advancements and Limitations—Disease

As virus specialist Nathan Wolfe pointed out, progress in science and

medicine, combined with government-run public health measures, drastically reduced illnesses and deaths from many diseases after 1900. These included pandemics, epidemic diseases that spread across national borders. The disease smallpox, for example, had plagued the ancient Egyptians and devastated the native population of the Americas and Australia. As recently as the 1960s, it killed millions of people each year. However, the World Health Organization (WHO) conducted a global vaccination campaign to wipe out the disease. In 1979, scientists declared success. Smallpox had been eliminated from the planet, except for the culture kept alive at the Centers for Disease Control in the United States.

Other diseases persisted, especially those related to poverty, including malaria, tuberculosis, and cholera. New epidemics also emerged, such as deadly strains of flu, HIV/AIDS, and Ebola. Other conditions, such as heart disease and Alzheimers, became more common as people began living longer. Each medical problem spurred even more technological and medical advances to try to combat it.