Usually, people with this problem have acne-like bumps or pustules in the affected areas.

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Severe acne tends also to involve inflammation, which can lead to scarring and painful pustules.

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Or they became covered with smallpox pustules and died of that.

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In these pre-vaccination days, smallpox pustules would be lanced, and their contents inserted into the skin of healthy people, producing a (hopefully) minor, localized infection which would then protect people from severe smallpox infection.

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