The Regional Committee,
Having considered the resolution WHA18.38 adopted by the Eighteenth World Health Assembly on the smallpox eradication programme, **
Noting:
- (1) that the Director-General has estimated that smallpox might be eradicated with international assistance; and
- (2) that the World Health Assembly has declared the world-wide eradication of smallpox to be one of the major objectives of the Organization;
Noting further that the World Health Assembly has requested:
- (1) Member States to give the programme greater support than in the past and to provide the substantial contributions essential for its execution; and
- (2) governments which carry on bilateral programmes of aid to include smallpox eradication in their programmes of assistance;
- BELIEVES that smallpox eradication should be one of the long-term objectives of the regional programme so that the funds formerly spent on the prevention and treatment of this disease can be used to solve other important public health problems;
- INVITES all Member States within the Region to give the fullest possible support to the world-wide smallpox eradication programme;
- SUGGESTS that those Member States are free from smallpox should consider investment in a world-wide effort to eradicate smallpox from those areas where it exists and to prevent its reintroduction;
- BELIEVES that the first and the most important step to be taken is for the Director-General to develop a global plan which will contain an effective and systematic analysis of where the difficult areas lie, as well as the areas where eradication has already been achieved.
** WHO Handbook of Resolutions and Decisions, Vol. I, 1973, p. 93-94