Brits' Plan in 1788 to Stop Smallpox May Have Backfired
Newser • • health
Key Points:
- New research suggests smallpox likely entered Australia in 1788 via "variola matter"—infected scabs used for inoculation—brought by surgeons on Britain's First Fleet, rather than through sick sailors.
- The First Fleet, consisting of 11 ships, founded the penal colony and may have carried the virus as powdered scabs to induce mild infections among settlers.
- The studies significantly revise estimates of the pre-colonial Aboriginal population from 200,000–800,000 to 2–3 million people.
- Researchers estimate that approximately 2.4 million Aboriginal people died due to disease, social disruption, and frontier violence in the early to mid-19th century.
- The findings challenge the idea that the British colonized a sparsely populated land and find no evidence of deliberate smallpox weaponization against Aboriginal communities.
