Alasdair Macintosh GeddesCBE (14 May 1934 – 9 April 2024) was a British medical doctor who was Professor of Infection at the University of Birmingham Medical School. In 1978, as the World Health Organization (WHO) was shortly to announce that the world's last case of smallpox had occurred a year earlier in Somalia, Geddes diagnosed a British woman with the disease in Birmingham, England. She was found to be the index case of the outbreak and became the world's last reported fatality due to the disease, five years after he had gained experience on the frontline of the WHO's smallpox eradication programme in Bangladesh in 1973.
Alasdair Geddes was born in Fortrose, near Inverness, Scotland, on 14 May 1934, to Angus and Isabella Geddes. His early education was at the Fortrose Academy, the local school.[1][2]
Geddes completed his early medical posts at the Royal Infirmary in Edinburgh and then in Perth, following which he spent two years completing National Service in the Royal Army Medical Corps, and rose to the rank of captain.[2][5] Subsequently, he gained experience in infectious diseases and general medicine first at Edinburgh and then as a medical registrar at Aberdeen and began research on antibiotics, with publications in the British Medical Journal and The Lancet. After a visit to the United States, he returned to Britain and took up a post as one of two consultants in infectious diseases at the East Birmingham (now Heartlands) Hospital in May 1967, at the same time as the local smallpox hospital, Witton Isolation Hospital, was deemed unnecessary and therefore demolished by fire. Geddes, at the time, settled in Solihull.[2][5]
He later recounted that when "I told my friends in Edinburgh that I was going to work in infectious diseases, they thought I was a bit stupid. They said you’re mad, infectious diseases are disappearing, we have antibiotics and vaccines, why don't you do something more interesting!"[5]
In October 1973, as a consequence of the oil crisis, he was called to return to England.[6] In the same year, he was designated Birmingham's smallpox consultant.[7] The following year, in an article in the British Medical Journal, he described signs and symptoms of smallpox and wrote that
the possibility of smallpox should be considered in every patient with unexplained fever who has recently visited the five countries of the world where this disease is still endemic—namely, India, Pakistan, Bangladesh, Nepal and Ethiopia. The likelihood of smallpox re-appearing in countries other than these five should always be remembered.[8]
Writing
In 1975, Geddes became chairman of the first editorial board of the Journal of Antimicrobial Chemotherapy.[4] In the same year, he co-edited the best-seller Control of Hospital Infection, later known as Ayliffe's Control of Healthcare-Associated Infection: A Practical Handbook.[9][10] In 1976 L. P. Garrod stated in his review of the book that it made much "of how to cope with a suspected case of smallpox. As the WHO claims that this disease is on the verge of extinction, even in Bangladesh, may future editions safely omit this?"[11] Throughout his career, Geddes authored almost 200 scientific publications covering a wide range of infectious disease topics.[5]
In August 1978, five years after returning from Bangladesh, Geddes diagnosed smallpox in Janet Parker, a medical photographer working in the East Wing of the medical school in Birmingham.[17][18][19] She had been admitted to Ward 32 at East Birmingham Hospital after being diagnosed with at first chickenpox and then a drug reaction. Several physicians saw her before Geddes was called to the hospital for an opinion. Aware that Parker also worked in a room above the regional smallpox laboratory, he in turn called upon virologist Henry Bedson and both confirmed their suspicions that same day when they examined fluid from Parker's blisters and saw brick-shaped particles under the electron microscope, compatible with smallpox. Until this time, all the call-outs he received for suspected smallpox cases were false-alarms such as erythema multiforme and Stevens–Johnson syndrome.[7][17][19] With the WHO about to announce the eradication of smallpox, it was widely thought that the last ever case of smallpox had occurred the previous year, in 1977 in Somalia. Parker later died on 11 September 1978 and became the last reported fatality due to the disease.[20] Later, in an interview in 2004, when asked if Parker's case had any link with the 1966 smallpox outbreak in Birmingham, he replied "it is probably significant that the initial case in the variola minor outbreak in the West Midlands in 1966 was, like Janet Parker, a photographer in the Birmingham Medical School, where research was being carried out on smallpox viruses."[5]
In the 1990s, Geddes was involved in tuberculosis (TB) research, leading the University of Birmingham team in the Glaxo Action tuberculosis programme that studied the molecular biology of Mycobacterium tuberculosis and new ways of delivering medicines into the TB infected cells. By studying how the human immune system responded to TB, Geddes hoped that the results would lead to a new vaccine, more effective than the BCG.[5][22]
Child with Smallpox, Bangladesh, 1973, the year Geddes was assigned to the WHO smallpox eradication effort in Bangladesh[23]
The rear of the Medical School showing the location of the smallpox laboratory (bottom) and the rooms where Parker worked (above)
The ward block at East Birmingham Hospital, Birmingham UK in 1978. It has since been demolished. It shows Wards 31 (ground level) and 32 (upper level).
Ward 32, where Geddes diagnosed smallpox in 1978
Electron micrograph of smallpox virus, similar to what Geddes would have seen in Parker's sample.[17][24]
University of Birmingham Medical School, where Geddes became professor
Later career
Following the September 11 attacks, Geddes became an adviser on bioterrorism for the UK's Department of Health, his chief role being in the national smallpox plan and in biodefence training.[5]
diagnosis of a smallpox case must not be underestimated. Differential diagnosis against influenza, chickenpox, Eczema herpeticum, Eczema vaccinatum and drug eruptions/erythema multiforme is necessary. The last smallpox case in Birmingham, UK, caused by a lab infection in 1978, was initially misdiagnosed by 3 physicians, leading to a significant delay in treatment and containment measures. This fact underlines the importance of an appropriate education and training of physicians to diagnose disease caused by bioterroristic agents as part of the preparedness plans.[25]
With smallpox in the media again after 2001, and noting that Parker had previously received two smallpox vaccinations, he became interested in how long immunity lasts in those who have previously been immunised. It led him to study and publish in 2005 an article on the Edinburgh smallpox outbreak of 1942, where six of the 36 cases of smallpox had received previous vaccination.[5] The following year he published "The history of smallpox".[26]
Geddes, Alasdair M.; Klugman, Keith P.; Rolinson, George N. (December 2007). "Introduction: historical perspective and development of amoxicillin/clavulanate". International Journal of Antimicrobial Agents. 30 (Suppl 2): S109–112. doi:10.1016/j.ijantimicag.2007.07.015. ISSN0924-8579. PMID17900874. (Joint author)
^ abPallen, Mark (2018). "24. Bangladesh 1973". The Last Days of Smallpox; Tragedy in Birmingham. Independently Published. pp. 71–73. ISBN9781980455226.
^ abPallen, Mark (2018). "33. A Unicorn on the Lawn". The Last Days of Smallpox; Tragedy in Birmingham. Independently published. pp. 98–104. ISBN9781980455226.
^Fraise, Adam P. (2009). "Preface to fifth edition". In Adam P. Fraise (ed.). Ayliffe's Control of Healthcare-Associated Infection: A Practical Handbook. Christina Bradley. Hodder Arnold. p. xi. ISBN978-1-4441-1307-5. Archived from the original on 17 April 2024. Retrieved 31 August 2020.
^ abcPallen, Mark (2018). "34. The Diagnosis". The Last Days of Smallpox; Tragedy in Birmingham. Independently Published. pp. 105–109. ISBN9781980455226.
^ abWilliams, Gareth (2010), Williams, Gareth (ed.), "Legacy of an Angel", Angel of Death: The Story of Smallpox, London: Palgrave Macmillan UK, pp. 355–372, doi:10.1057/9780230293199_16, ISBN978-0-230-29319-9
^Geddes, Alasdair (September 2002) “Smallpox – Pathology and Clinical Features”Archived 4 September 2020 at the Wayback Machine. G7+ - Global Health Security Initiative (GHSI); Workshop, Best Practices in Vaccine Production for Smallpox and other Potential Pathogens. Paul-Ehrlich-Institut, Langen (Germany), P. 16
^"Garrod Lecture & Medal". The British Society for Antimicrobial Chemotherapy. 2021. Archived from the original on 2 November 2021. Retrieved 2 November 2021.
^Geddes, A. (2000) "Infection in the twenty-first century: predictions and postulates". The 1999 Garrod Lecture. Journal of Antimicrobial Chemotherapy. School of Medicine, University of Birmingham. Vol. 46, pp. 873–877
^Pallen, Mark (2018). "27. Personal Interlude. Coming to Birmingham". The Last Days of Smallpox; Tragedy in Birmingham. Independently Published. p. 94. ISBN9781980455226.