Dr. William Foege dies at 89; leader in smallpox eradication was called the Father of Global Health'

"The 6-foot-7 inch Foege literally stood out in the field of public health. A whip-smart medical doctor with a calm demeanor, he had a canny knack for beating back infectious diseases. He was director of the U.S. Centers for Disease Control and Prevention in the late 1970s and early 1980s, and later held other key leadership roles in campaigns against international health problems."

"But his greatest achievement came before all that, with his work on smallpox, one of the most lethal diseases in human history. For centuries, it killed about one-third of the people it infected and left most survivors with deep scars on their faces from the pus-filled lesions. Smallpox vaccination campaigns were well established by the time Foege was a young doctor."

Dr. William Foege pioneered a ring containment vaccination strategy that was pivotal to global smallpox eradication. He developed the approach while working as a medical missionary in Nigeria in the 1960s, focusing on rapid case identification and vaccinating contacts because vaccine supplies were limited. The method relied on quick epidemiological detective work rather than mass immunization. Foege served as director of the U.S. Centers for Disease Control and Prevention in the late 1970s and early 1980s and held leadership roles in international health campaigns. He co-founded the Task Force for Global Health and died in Atlanta at age 89.

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