The coronavirus pandemic that has swept the world has once again reminded us how powerless humanity is in the face of the spread of previously unseen diseases. The more valuable is the experience of dealing with such global epidemics, passed down to us by our ancestors. It seems that it is high time to remember that in the late 1950s the USSR risked getting on its territory an equally large-scale disaster, which was prevented only by a miracle.
The main reasons for the penetration of smallpox into the Soviet Union, which was considered defeated, were human carelessness and neglect of their official duties. Nevertheless, this was compensated for by subsequent harsh measures, and the epidemic was nipped in the bud.
Connoisseur of the East
Honored Art Worker of the RSFSR and laureate of two Stalin Prizes, poster artist Alexei Alekseevich Kokorekin was born in Sarykamysh - then it was the Kara region of the Russian Empire, and today it is one of the ordinary cities of Turkey. It was the origin that influenced the fact that Kokorekin was crazy about Eastern culture. And in that ill-fated 1959, he was going to visit India, where it was planned to participate in the ceremony of burning one of the brahmanas.
The trip was initially fatal. The fact is that even though in the USSR victory over all mass diseases was proclaimed, no one was insured against infection abroad, therefore, before leaving for potentially dangerous states - and India occupied the leading positions in this list - all Soviet citizens underwent compulsory vaccination … But Kokorekin considered that this procedure would negatively affect his potency and, as a result, intimate relations with his wife and mistress, so he managed to forge a vaccination certificate. But no one yet knew that the burned brahman died precisely because of smallpox, and now the infection was on his clothes and corpse - thus, the burned body became a kind of Chernobyl reactor, the poison from which spread throughout the district. The unvaccinated Kokorekin not only attended the burning ceremony - he sketched it from nature, and also held his hands over the funeral pyre and touched the brahmana's clothes. Moreover, he managed to acquire the carpet of the deceased, on which, according to rumors, he died. This was more than enough - patient zero was ready.
The artist was in a hurry to go home - he managed not only to see more in India than was planned, but also to thoroughly purchase all sorts of exotic gifts. So, another fatal coincidence of circumstances can be considered the fact that Kokorekin returned to the USSR a day ahead of schedule, so that his wife would not suspect anything - this was after 13 days of stay in India. Until the end of the incubation period of smallpox, there was still a day, and therefore no one suspected anything at the border. Of course, the artist coughed, but is that unusual for the Moscow December frosts?
The next night Kokorekin spent with his mistress, after which he went to his waiting wife. Both ladies were literally inundated with contaminated gifts, which, of course, did not sit in one place for a long time, but went from hand to hand in thrift stores.
Promotional video:
Meanwhile, the artist was getting worse. In addition to his growing cough, he had a fever. The visit to the polyclinic gave the expected result - the diagnosis was "flu" and the recommendation to be treated at home. However, a couple of days later, the condition became critical, and then Kokorekin was hospitalized in the infectious diseases department of the Botkin Hospital. However, then a generation of doctors worked in it, who did not face in practice diseases like smallpox, so the artist continued to be treated for the flu. The resulting rash was attributed to an allergic reaction.
On December 29, Kokorekin died. Since he was an honored artist, a qualified medical report on the causes of death was required. Academician Mikhail Morozov had to deal with them, who only had one glance at the artist's skin covered with a black crust to say unequivocally - variola vera. Smallpox.
Scale isolation
The words spoken by the academician produced the effect of a thunderbolt out of the blue. The scale of what was happening was gradually realized. The infected Kokorekin not only walked freely around the Soviet capital for several days, but also brought with him a bunch of Indian gifts, which could now be located anywhere.
The KGB was extremely tough. The entire Botkin hospital was closed for the strictest quarantine; people, doctors and casual visitors who were there were strictly forbidden to leave the isolated zone. All contacts of the artist who returned to Moscow, which numbered in the thousands, were carefully worked out and sent to forced quarantine. So, one of the contacts with Kokorekin was a university teacher - he, as well as all the students who worked with him, were isolated. With great difficulty on the shelves of Shabolovsky and Leninsky commission stores, it was possible to find and destroy dangerous Indian gifts, and also isolate all visitors. It got to the point that Soviet passenger planes were deployed in the sky over Europe, on which those with whom the artist had communicated shortly before his death flew. Also, customs officers were quarantined,who missed the infected in India Kokorekin, a taxi driver who gave him a lift, a doctor at a polyclinic where the artist turned on the issue of "flu", as well as all their close associates.
New Year's Moscow seemed to have returned to the siege year 1941. Entrances and exits from the city were completely blocked. Trains did not run, planes did not fly, cars did not drive - except for ambulances visiting the residences of those who could at least cross their eyes with the sick Kokorekin. All infectious diseases hospitals in Moscow were redesigned into quarantine boxes, where isolated ones were brought - their number very soon exceeded tens of thousands of people. The city was supplied with everything necessary - to meet the quarantine needs, the State Reserve stocks were printed.
From the outside, such measures may seem excessive, but here are just a few facts suggesting the opposite: a day after Kokorekin's death, smallpox was detected not only in the doctors and the receptionist who directly contacted him, but even in a teenager who was lying in the hospital on the floor below, - the infection was transmitted to him through the ventilation hole. And even at the hospital stoker, who just had to walk past the artist's chamber. Considering how contagious this disease was, it is not difficult to imagine what scale the epidemic could reach if the city authorities had not taken such radical measures to preserve Moscow.
Happy outcome
The second stage in the fight against smallpox, in addition to the strict isolation of Kokorekin's contacts, was the mass vaccination of all those living in Moscow. Within three days from the moment the zero patient was identified, more than 10 million doses of smallpox vaccine were delivered to the capital from all sanitary and epidemiological stations of the Soviet Union - just over 7 million people lived in Moscow at that time, including both Muscovites and city guests. Every week, doctors, paramedics and medical students, United in 10 thousand vaccination teams, vaccinated up to one and a half million people.
44 days after Academician Morozov uttered the phrase "variola vera", smallpox retreated and surrendered. The results of a month and a half "epidemic" are striking: it was officially confirmed that 19 people were infected directly from contact with Kokorekin - an artist, 7 family members and 11 people in the Botkin hospital. These 19 people transmitted the infection to 23 more Muscovites, who, in turn, managed to infect three more. In total, three people died from smallpox.
Fewer than 50 infected people per city of seven million, which is the central transport hub of the Soviet state - perhaps no other figures need to be given.
It seems that a thorough study of the experience of combating smallpox at the turn of 1959-1960 will help to cope with the current coronavirus pandemic, as well as improve the preventive measures of the city in the future.
Magazine: Mysteries of History №19