Did You Know?

• Atopic Dermatitis, also know as eczema, is a persistent disease of the skin. "Atopic" refers to an inherited susceptibility to allergic conditions, and "dermatitis" means inflammation of the skin.
• In AD, the skin becomes extremely itchy, resulting in scratching and increased redness, swelling, and cracking. In most cases there are periods of worsening or flaring called exacerbation followed by improvement or clearing called remission.
• Lifetime prevalence of AD is between 10-20%. Eighty-five percent of cases appear in the first year of life and 95% by age 4.
• AD that is widely distributed over the body occurs most often in infants; older children and adults tend to have the flexural pattern that affects elbow and knee creases and the hands.
• People with AD are susceptible to recurrent viral infections of the skin such as eczema herpeticum (a widespread herpes skin infection) or molluscum contagiosum (pearly wart-like skin lesions).
• People with AD should not receive smallpox vaccinations, even if the AD has disappeared for many years, because of increased risk of a serious and potentially fatal complication called eczema vaccinatum.
• To protect individuals with AD or a history of AD, their household contacts also should not receive smallpox vaccine. For this reason close to 50% of the population is currently not eligible for smallpox vaccinations.
• Routine smallpox vaccinations ended in the United States in 1972. In 1980 the World Health Organization (WHO) certified the world free of naturally occurring smallpox.
• Because smallpox vaccinations stopped, the majority of humankind is now susceptible to the smallpox virus.
• Because there is a threat that smallpox may be used as a weapon,military and healthcare professionals have begun receiving smallpox vaccinations for the first time in more than 30 years.
• In the case of a smallpox outbreak tens of millions of people will have to be vaccinated. Over six million people received the vaccine in New York in the 1940’s after a single case was introduced from abroad.

This project has been funded in whole or in part with federal funds from the National Institute of Allergy and Infectious Diseases, National Institutes of Health, Department of Health and Human Services, under contract No. HHSN266200400029C.