Modern Weapons That Could Be Even More Dangerous Than A Nuclear Bomb – SlashGear

Biological weapons can include harmful viruses, bacteria, fungi, or insects. Their use in war or other conflicts is illegal and for good reason. They can absolutely devastate civilian populations, cause untold suffering, and the side releasing them has no actual control over the weapon itself. Historically, the use of biological weapons is as old as war itself. During medieval times, rotten animal carcasses and the corpses of plague victims would be catapulted into castles during sieges. The logic was, disease was more likely to make a fortress surrender, and if a spattering of plague didn’t make the white flag go up — there’s a chance it would simply kill or incapacitate everyone and make a forced entry easier. 

More recently, blankets laced with smallpox were handed out during the French and Indian Wars in an attempt to devastate Native American tribes. Smallpox is one of the big worries when it comes to bioweapons. It was wiped out in the wild by 1977, but samples still exist in various labs. There are also concerns about diseases like Ebola, which kills the majority of people it infects. Ebola is hard to contract as it requires contact with an indicted person’s bodily fluids, which is why outbreaks have been limited. Although unlikely, it is possible that Ebola could be modified to be more infectious and ultimately more deadly. Other diseases could also be tweaked and potentially turned into devastating bioweapons. A nuclear weapon can wipe out a city, but in certain circumstances, a microscopic virus could take out most of the planet.