My RN license has expired but I hope someone can tell me when the 10 year duration of protection following smallpox vaccination kicked in. My Mom was vaccinated when she was 5, she is now 86. I was vaccinated when I was 5, am now almost 60. Neither of us, nor several million other Americans, have had boosters every 10 years, unless traveling out of the country some years back. In the years that passed Small Pox ceased to BE.
Question!!! At what point did the immunity cease to exist for us? Were folks in our port cities given boosters that we didn't know about? Were the medical experts liars when they said the protection was for life, "OR" is there a new variety of this old virus that we need to consider?
You might be immune for life, it depends on if your memory cells against vaccinia still exist in your body, and most likely if you aren't completely immune, you'd just get a less serious case and fight it off faster----but you'd still be contagious and could spread it to people around you who have no immunity at all. People who ever received chemotherapy could easily have lost all their immunity.