A Pox on Our House

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7th episode of the 7th season of House

"A Pox on Our House"

House episode
Episode no.| Season 7
Episode 7
Directed by| Tucker Gates
Written by| Lawrence Kaplow
Original air date| November 15, 2010 (2010-11-15)
Guest appearances

* Cynthia Watros as Dr. Sam Carr
* Samantha Smith as Lulu
* Andrew Fiscella as Niles
* Hayley Chase as Julie
* Aaron Refvem as Roger
* Devon Woods as Eve
* Tess Kartel as Geerte
* Dylan Baker as Dr. Dave Broda
* Neil Sandilands as Captain Vanderhoof

Episode chronology
| ← Previous
"Office Politics"  | Next →
"Small Sacrifices"

|

House season 7
List of episodes

"A Pox on Our House" is the seventh episode of the seventh season of the American medical drama House. It aired on Fox on November 15, 2010.

## Plot

[edit]

In the 18th century, the Sotos Oosterzoon, a Dutch slave ship, travels to Bermuda. There is an outbreak of smallpox among the African captives and, fearing quarantine, the crew throw the slaves overboard but it is too late: the ship is fired upon and intentionally sunk, along with its crew and captives, in order to contain the disease.

In modern day, a family on vacation dive into the wreckage of the slave ship. A teen girl brings a sealed glass jar back up from the wreck. She accidentally breaks the jar, cutting herself and exposing herself to the contents of the jar: scabs from the diseased captives.

House is certain that the disease is smallpox, coming immediately to the same diagnosis as the crew. The family is quarantined, the girl and father, being especially compromised, are put in an isolation room, and the team administers the smallpox vaccine to the two.

As soon as the tell-tale blisters begin to appear, the CDC is called per protocol and institutes a lockdown. As the lockdown is occurring, the team discovers a rash on the girl's armpits inconsistent with smallpox, causing House to change his diagnosis.

Dr. Dave Broda, the CDC official overseeing the case, blocks House's team from contact with the patients to make a new diagnosis, so they turn to the only other evidence they have: the captain's logs from the wrecked slave vessel. House enlists the aid of a translator, a Dutch webcam stripper he finds on the internet.

Based on the information in the logs, House is reconfirmed in his opinion that the girl does not have smallpox. House attempts to lie to get his team into the room to test his hypothesis, but is stopped. Masters, although unable to closely examine the patient, notices that the girl lacks the characteristic pustules that would be expected from smallpox.

Meanwhile, the boy's father begins to develop smallpox symptoms as well, but more characteristic symptoms. House is confounded as to why it appears that the girl does not have smallpox after all, but her father does. He concludes that the father contracted the disease from the smallpox vaccine they gave him. Unbeknownst to them, the father's immune system has been compromised by the return of his kidney cancer (which had been in remission).

House demands they administer the treatment for the smallpox variola. When Broda refuses, House risks his own life by entering the containment room and administers the treatment to save the patient. However, the father does not respond to the medication and dies. House figures now that the disease was likely smallpox after all, and also realizes that he has consequently exposed himself.

The rest of the team is despondent, but Masters returns to the journal in desperate search for another diagnosis. She notes that a cat on the ship had lost all his fur and then died, strong evidence for rickettsialpox, a disease easily treatable with antibiotics. Masters tasks House with searching the father's body for eschars. When House successfully spots eschars on the body, Broda orders that the daughter be treated with doxycycline, saving her life.

In a subplot, Wilson and Sam reexamine their relationship while treating a young chemotherapy patient whose mother gets locked outside of the hospital during the lockdown. House and Cuddy also face relationship difficulties after Cuddy discovers House lied to her in "Office Politics" in order to administer an unconventional treatment of Hepatitis C (an injection of Hepatitis A) to a patient.

## Critical response

[edit]

The A.V. Club gives this episode a score of B−.[1]

## References

[edit]

1. ^ Zack Handlen (November 15, 2010). "A Pox on Our House. If you don't look out, the smallpox'll getcha". The A.V. Club. The Onion. Archived from the original on November 19, 2010.

## External links

[edit]

Wikiquote has quotations related to A Pox on Our House.

* "A Pox on Our House" at Fox.com
* "A Pox on Our House" at IMDb

* v
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House

Characters|

* Gregory House
* Lisa Cuddy
* James Wilson
* Allison Cameron
* Remy "Thirteen" Hadley
* Lawrence Kutner
* Stacy Warner
* Michael Tritter

Episodes|

| Season 1|

* "Pilot"
* "Paternity"
* "Three Stories"

|

Season 2|

* "Autopsy"
* "Spin"
* "Hunting"
* "The Mistake"
* "Deception"
* "Failure to Communicate"
* "Need to Know"
* "Clueless"
* "All In"
* "House vs. God"
* "Who's Your Daddy?"

Season 3|

* "Informed Consent"
* "Lines in the Sand"
* "Finding Judas"
* "Half-Wit"

Season 4|

* "Mirror Mirror"
* "Whatever It Takes"
* "Ugly"
* "You Don't Want to Know"
* "Frozen"
* "No More Mr. Nice Guy"
* "Living the Dream"
* "House's Head"
* "Wilson's Heart"

Season 5|

* "Not Cancer"
* "Lucky Thirteen"
* "Last Resort"
* "Here Kitty"
* "Locked In"
* "Simple Explanation"
* "Both Sides Now"

Season 6|

* "Broken"
* "Known Unknowns"
* "Ignorance Is Bliss"
* "Wilson"
* "The Down Low"
* "Remorse"
* "5 to 9"
* "The Choice"
* "Baggage"
* "Help Me"

Season 7|

* "Selfish"
* "Unwritten"
* "Unplanned Parenthood"
* "Office Politics"
* "A Pox on Our House"
* "Small Sacrifices"
* "Larger than Life"
* "Carrot or Stick"
* "Bombshells"
* "Out of the Chute"
* "Fall from Grace"
* "The Dig"
* "Changes"
* "The Fix"
* "Moving On"

Season 8|

* "Twenty Vicodin"
* "Transplant"
* "Charity Case"
* "Risky Business"
* "The Confession"
* "Parents"
* "Dead & Buried"
* "Perils of Paranoia"
* "Runaways"
* "Nobody's Fault"
* "Chase"
* "Man of the House"
* "Love Is Blind"
* "Blowing the Whistle"
* "Gut Check"
* "We Need the Eggs"
* "Body & Soul"
* "The C-Word"
* "Post Mortem"
* "Holding On"
* "Everybody Dies"

Related|

* Cast list
* Accolades
* Soundtrack
* Nurse Jeffrey
* Doctor Tyrsa
* Doctor Richter
* Hekimoğlu

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