Victor Methos - Plague

“It was, by all accounts-and modern forensics conducted by the University of Tubingen has confirmed this-the worst natural disaster in human history. Responsible for the death of over half the world’s population. We believe it had its genesis in China and spread from there. It went through the Middle East, devastated Africa, and was recurring in Europe centuries later. It would disappear and then reappear twenty years later to re-infect a new generation.”

The screen shifted to a screenshot from under an electron microscope.

“You can see here that it appears much like common bubonic plague, but with these ridges here on the periphery of the virus. In fact, we believed for a long time that it was the bubonic plague, but research conducted on the remains of priests in Constantinople-it was the common practice at the time to bury priests in underground catacombs, making a type of preserve for tissue-shows us that it was in fact some now extinct form of Yersinia pestis.

“If you can imagine the scene in Constantinople, you can see how frightening this particular contagion really was. Bodies were piled so high in the streets that they were like roadblocks at every turn. Justinian eventually ordered the burning of the bodies on the outskirts of the cities and this calmed the contagion until the next iteration. But to be perfectly clear, we don’t know why this contagion occurred, or why it went extinct.

“In my research into the plague of Justinian, I developed a coding system, a type of shorthand, for the infectibility of a particular contagion. I did this so that those outside the medical and scientific communities could understand the level of threat they were facing with any disease. I called it the T score and now it is a widely accepted rating model.

“Its theory is simple: T-1 means that the contagion is such that each person infected, on average, will infect one other individual. The common flu is a T-1 contagion. The bubonic plague was a T-3 contagion. The plague of Justinian was a T-4. The scale goes to T-7, which, in effect, would cause the extinction of all mammalian life on earth.”

Ralph looked up to the screen as it changed to a shot of the earth. It went through the different iterations of T, showing small red spots that grew as the infectibility rate progressed. At T-5, all human life on earth was extinguished. He looked back to the audience and adjusted his glasses.

“This contagion has been determined to be a strand of smallpox. What strand, we cannot say for sure, though we have our theories that it could be black pox. Smallpox, and its derivative black pox, currently, only exist in two places on the planet earth: the CDC BSL 4 labs in Atlanta, and a remote outpost in the former Soviet Union. Other than that, man has conquered and abolished it. It has, to put it bluntly, come back somehow.” He shook his head. “Mother nature always has surprises in store for us it seems.

“Our most important goal for this contagion is determining its T score, containing it, and if possible, destroying it.” He adjusted his glasses again. “I see many worried looks in the audience. I myself am not taken to panic and I apologize if I seem too relaxed in discussing this subject. But please do not misinterpret my calm for a lack of concern. To put it bluntly, we are looking at an extinction-level event. At least, for mankind.”

Wilson sat down after the Q amp; A and a general took his place to begin talking about logistics. Sam noticed that there were no reporters asking questions, just a news crew taking video and audio.

When the general was done speaking, everybody stood and mingled a bit before filing out of the room. Duncan remained seated and sipped his drink as he stared off into space.

“You look worried,” Sam said.

“About possibly the deadliest disease known to man popping its head up? What’s there to worry about?” He wiped his lips with a napkin. “Sorry, that was a smart-ass thing to say. It’s actually not so much that. I work with stuff almost as dangerous every day.”

“Then what is it?”

“It doesn’t make sense. Smallpox is abolished. It doesn’t exist except in those two laboratories. Why would nature just ‘spring’ it on us? And here of all places?”

“I don’t think it was here. I’ve been tracking down the index patient’s history and he was a tour guide in South America.”

“Even if it originated in South America, it’s an extinct organism. We wiped it from the face of the earth. It can’t just come back.”

“So what do you think’s going on?”

“I don’t know. I don’t even know why I feel uneasy about it. Do you know there’s a type of moth that only lives for twenty-four hours? It’s born without a mouth so it doesn’t eat. It does have a full digestive system and could produce excrement if it could eat. It just doesn’t have a mouth. Sometimes nature is random and cruel. Who am I to think this disease wasn’t just waiting in the jungle for us somewhere and has decided to come out of hiding now? But still, I’m uneasy about it.”

“I think your point is a good one. I thought the same thing when I was told it was black pox. It shouldn’t exist. And the region the tour guide was exposed to is a place he’s been probably dozens of times before. It doesn’t make sense that if the virus were living in some host there that only now we would be seeing the beginnings of an epidemic.”

He looked up, his eyes in bewilderment. “Holy crap, is that really what we have now? An epidemic? I never thought I would actually live to see one. I mean a real one, not the swine flu BS. An actual Book of Revelation epidemic.”

She bent down and took one of the bagels. “You almost sound excited saying that. I wouldn’t be.”

Samantha sat in her hotel room through the morning and into the afternoon, running through medical charts for all the patients admitted to Queen’s Medical with black pox-like symptoms. There were now over a hundred; forty had been added since last night.

Samantha stretched her neck and stared out the window. In epidemics, like in anything that had an outward spreading force, you would hit a tipping point and there would be no turning back. If every patient infected only one other patient, the disease would actually be in decline. Without hitting that tipping point, it would simply run its course and die out. But if it hit the tipping point, it would grow exponentially, and the point itself is unpredictable. The difference could be a half of one person infectibility rate among the population. If every person infected 1.1 instead of just 1 person, that could cause the epidemic to grow beyond control.

Sam rose from her bed and began pacing the room. The thoughts darting in and out of her mind going back to her CDC training courses. The CDC’s procedure in a situation like this was clear: isolate, isolate, isolate. Any patient with even a hint of the disease was not allowed anywhere near the general public. Medical staff never made contact with them and anyone that had direct contact was quarantined. Even those that did not have direct contact were observed closely.

She thought of the families; it was always a painful process for families. They would have to watch loved ones through glass and plastic, and that was if they were lucky. Many times families would be unable to see their loved ones for weeks and then one day Sam or another field agent would call to notify the family of the death. It tore Sam’s heart out every time she had to place one of those calls.

A simple flu in 1918 had killed off millions of people. With an agent as deadly as this, Sam truly felt that not just the community, but the species might be teetering on the brink of extinction.