The Global Great Society and the US commitment to smallpox eradication

In 1965, Lyndon B. Johnson announced that the United States would join the fledgling global program to eradicate smallpox, beginning with a program in West Africa. The American commitment to smallpox eradication represented a broader effort in the United States and the developing world to expand international health programs and build a Global Great Society. The Global Great Society came to grief, but global smallpox eradication would ultimately succeed.