On Friday 11 August 1978, Janet Parker was getting ready for work when her head started to pound. Established in 1779, Birmingham medical school is one of the oldest in the country. His laboratory was one of fewer than 20 in the world to hold stocks of the virus, including two others in the UK – Liverpool medical school and St Mary’s medical school, London. Dumbell handed over some vials of smallpox virus. She left the medical school a year later to have her second child, and went into teaching.

Source: The Guardian November 21, 2020 09:22 UTC