At least 19 people in three Midwestern states have contracted a disease related to smallpox, marking the first outbreak of the life-threatening illness in the United States, federal heath officials said yesterday.
"We have an outbreak," said James Hughes, director of the CDC's National Center for Infectious Diseases in Atlanta. "I'd like to keep it relatively small. I don't want any more cases. We're doing everything we can to try to contain this."
