[Thud]

"Smallpox can't be triggered by the vaccine, since it's cowpox."

Smallpox vaccine is not based on cowpox. It uses a different virus. The article implied it would be pretty easy to make a bunch of cowpox and use that to protect against smallpox in the absence of special-purpose vaccine, but that cowpox wouldn't work as well as the special-purpose vaccine designed for use against smallpox.

[Sabertooth]

Smallpox vaccine is not based on cowpox. It uses a different virus.

That doesn't concur with anything I've read, nor statements from some of the FReeper docs in this forum.

Gotta source for that?

The article implied it would be pretty easy to make a bunch of cowpox and use that to protect against smallpox in the absence of special-purpose vaccine, but that cowpox wouldn't work as well as the special-purpose vaccine designed for use against smallpox.

I looked in the article for where you took this inference, and I'm guessing this is it...

Perhaps one in a million will die from vaccination, while more will be disabled. Newer vaccines are safer. Rapid production of less effective vaccine using raw cowpox might be possible, but distribution in undeveloped countries during a world epidemic is problematic.

I don't believe this is saying that the newer vaccines aren't cowpox-based, just that they're a safer form of it. The distinction being made is between cowpox-based vaccines and raw cowpox inoculation.

[Paleo Conservative]

'Smallpox can't be triggered by the vaccine, since it's cowpox.'

Smallpox vaccine is not based on cowpox.

Dictionary.com vaccine

Edward Jenner (1749-1823)

Sabertooth is correct. The word "vaccine" comes from the Latin word vacca meaning cow. Jenner coined the term "vaccination" to describe his method of infecting humans with the safer cowpox pathogen to induce immunity to smallpox. Later the term "vaccination" was broadended to include protection against other diseases.