Weatherday: Disease defeated

Egyptian sarcophagi in the New York Metropolitan Museum of Art (2014).

Rain moving in from the west this morning will be persistent and heaviest through lunchtime and early afternoon. Some clear spells likely later.

Temperatures up to 8deg in moderate to fresh breezes from the south, shifting westerly and easing after nightfall.

On this day in 1979, the deadly disease of smallpox was declared officially eradicated, after a 10-year global vaccination programme run by the World Health Organisation.

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