After the epidemic is over, they are forgotten

Banu (sitting), seen here with her husband and two of their daughters, still suffers from the emotional scars and stigma of having had smallpox. — Photos: TNS

As a toddler in rural Bangladesh, Rahima Banu was the last person in the world known to contract variola major – the deadly form of smallpox – through natural infection.

In October 1975, after World Health Organization (WHO) epidemiologists learned of her infection, health workers vaccinated those around her, putting an end to variola major transmission around the world.