antitoxin

There is an antitoxin that doctors can give.

It has a case fatality rate of as high as 40% if not treated with antitoxin—supplies of which are “very constrained,” WHO reported.

As diphtheria - a serious and sometimes fatal bacterial infection - spread among Nome's people, its port was icebound, meaning antitoxin would have to be delivered overland.

In February 1925, in the midst of a diphtheria outbreak, a relay of sled dog teams delivered an emergency supply of antitoxin to Nome, Alaska, which had been isolated by snow.

Dr. Park was responsible for helping mass-produce an antitoxin that served as a breakthrough in treating and preventing diphtheria, a disease that killed many of the small children and others who share his burial ground.