One important part in history that a virus was put to
good use was when the cowpox virus was used to
combat the deadly smallpox virus.
Thanks to cowpox, smallpox was even declared eradicated
in the early 1980ies.
Cowpox is still not a very nice virus to many animals,
but we got to choose between two evils
and got rid of the worst of the two.

Research on viruses continues.
And the results so far are promising, but effort is
being made so no rushed results will be released
into the world.…because the real world should at least be
a little smarter than scary science fiction books.
We have seen some of these result in the covid-19 vaccines.
These vaccines are proof that the research has paid off and
how important it is to keep supporting virus research.
When we forget about the importance of a subject,
support goes down and research slow down.
We can’t remember everything all the time,
not even all those numerous important things.
But awareness days give our memories this little extra boost.

• https://www.mentalfloss.com/article/53034/happy-virus-appreciation-day