When General George Washington wrote in 1777 that "necessity not only authorizes but seems to require the measure," he was referring not to military strategy but rather a health strategy: inoculating the entire Continental Army against a raging smallpox epidemic.
Such a mandate was unprecedented, but Washington determined that the benefits outweighed any risks: defeating the far superior British forces could only be achieved, he reasoned, if his troops were healthy.
The above is an excerpt of a piece originally published in Fox News.
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