Natural Smallpox was contained and wiped out. No further cures are necessary. Small virus stocks remain in the U.S. and Russia.

One angle of the research concerned a vaccine to be used as a countermeasure if somebody created a Smallpox bioweapon.

This is a preliminary computer screening for promising drugs. It takes some years off of the early screening process, but not the drug synthesis and testing phases. It can still narrow the choices of promising drugs.

How many years does it take to find something you lost? When you find it, you stop looking. Otherwise it could take many years.