Virus: The Day of Resurrection (15 page)

“At any rate, at present, a few dozen percent of the world’s scientists are doing direct research into horrible weapons of mass slaughter. At this very instant, while we are working to save the entire world from epidemic disease, others in our field, working elsewhere with budgets far more generous and in facilities far more lavish than ours, are seeking to find out if there is some way to precisely and swiftly cause a terrible epidemic; to discover if there is some way to tear the immune systems of a theoretical enemy to shreds. If their enemies would wait, so would they. This awful game is played the same way in the case of nuclear weapons. That’s why the three-step across-the-board disarmament proposal by Khrushchev long ago—”

“Doctor …” Robert said sullenly. “Do you think this Tibetan flu is some country’s germ warfare exercise?”

“Now that’s a little too far out.” Dubois finally smiled. “I don’t think there’s any country studying influenza, of all things, for germ warfare. Even though it’s possible for frightening new strains to appear like we’re seeing now … no … wait just a second …” Dr. Dubois thought for a moment. “There’s an outside chance of such a possibility.”

Then he started laughing. “But no, it couldn’t be. First of all, influenza is—”

Suddenly there was the sound of a door opening, and when the doctor turned around the young man had vanished from the room. Dr. Albert Dubois sighed once and turned his attention to the report papers that Robert had left. He would hand these data over to the statisticians, and from there the “aspect” of this epidemic would be determined. In the science of epidemic prevention, “prevalence aspect” was a new way of thinking Dubois advocated. This method viewed the traits of an epidemic not only in terms of the contagion itself, but also in terms of societal factors, and took into account a variety of elements—pre-existing preventive systems, a society’s ability to mobilize itself for prevention, how much the general populace knew about the disease, weather conditions, and more—crunching them into index numbers to determine the type of epidemic and make ongoing predictions. It was just like deciding on a general strategy in wartime.

No
, the doctor thought glumly.
This may become a real war this time. Although we’re lucky that this is just influenza, it’s still too severe. But if this had been plague …

The international systems for the prevention of epidemics had already taken a heavy blow. In one country, that blow had been so devastating that there was nothing that could be done now but watch as events ran their course. All of the information networks and fixed systems for worldwide general disease prevention that should have had the mobility to make mutual distribution between prevention organizations possible were still on the drawing board, and although a number of plans were now being carried out in response to the outbreak, it was worrisome that they were not so much trying to prevent the disease from spreading as they were trying to stop it from spreading any further.

It’s a strange thing
, the doctor thought, hanging his head.
Mumps … Newcastle disease, parainfluenza HA3, influenza A-Minus … it’s almost as if the whole myxovirus group has decided to declare war on us at once, and with most of them appearing in new strains. Could this be a coincidence? Or could some change have taken place in the common root of a virus group that has some relation to the myxovirus subset of mucopolysaccharides? The viruses for mumps and Newcastle disease are similar. Could an exchange have taken place with one of its subtypes? But the influenza virus is different in both size and shape. It doesn’t seem possible that they could have undergone a common mutation. If they had, would it just be an unlucky coincidence that their timing overlapped? Or could there be
something
driving the whole myxovirus group?

The doctor stood up and looked out the window to give his tired eyes some rest. There was warm afternoon sunlight out there—the sun at the height of spring, pouring down its scintillating radiance.

There’s still so much we don’t understand. Maybe we’ll have a better grasp on the complexities of viral evolution someday. Eventually, I’m sure we will. But it sure makes me nervous to think of how much time we’ll need to find the answers. I just hope some disaster that beggars the understanding of this age won’t come while we still lack them.

The doctor shook his head and stood up. Somehow, he felt like something of a fatalist today. It was probably because he’d buttonholed that young fellow and then given him a speech about germ warfare.

Against the vicious onslaught of this new type of influenza, the worldwide forces of disease prevention turned their efforts from methods of vaccine production that depended on fertilized eggs toward those requiring tissue culture to better make preparations for the long hard battle ahead. They did not yet realize, however, that one more truly horrific shadow remained concealed behind this Tibetan flu and was drawing ever nearer to every part of the world.

The virus! The smallest life-form on this planet—a microscopic mystery standing athwart the border between inanimate matter and life. The smallest family of virus averaged only twenty-one millimicrons across—one fifty-thousandth of a millimeter in size. The tube-shaped tobacco mosaic virus was only a bare fifteen millimicrons in diameter. Inside it was a hole twenty angstroms in diameter containing ribonucleic acid, in which was hidden the mechanisms of life and heredity. (An angstrom is one ten-millionth of a millimeter; atoms of heavy metals are about 2.5 angstroms in diameter; the wavelength of normal light is five thousand five hundred angstroms.) Almost a century had passed since Friedrich August Johannes Loeffler and Heinrich Hermann Robert Koch in 1898 first proved that bovine hoof and mouth disease was caused by organisms smaller than the holes in a Chamberland filter, and since that time the mysterious nature of the virus had become clearer. Scientists continued to build on that research, particularly in the 1950s and 1960s, with the advent of super-magnifying electron microscopes with resolutions of five angstroms or smaller, allowing all kinds of new discoveries to be made not only in the culturing of viruses, but also in biochemistry, microbiology, molecular genetics, cancer research, and—thanks to the use of electronic calculators—statistical research. Thanks to the multidisciplinary activities within various fields of science and the development of international research organizations, science and technology had developed explosively. However, even as the scalpel of understanding had proceeded in laying bare the hidden things of the world, the complexity of the knowledge gained had grown ever deeper—deeper to a confusing degree, in fact. In particular, the Max Planck Laboratory had recently succeeded in creating a new virus by artificially changing the base distribution of nucleic acid in electrolytic fluid. Also, in a joint project of America’s National Institutes of Health, Rockefeller Labs, and Tokyo University’s Virus Research Lab, a bizarre phenomenon had been observed—when perfectly healthy human fetal cells that had been cultured in a sterile environment were irradiated, mutant viruses were suddenly born from the cells’ nuclei.

Even as great strides were being made in the field of virology, the practical application of these discoveries was, compared to what was theoretically possible, lagging several steps behind. Medicines that could cure a wide range of viral diseases, drugs analogous to broad-spectrum antibiotics in the bacterial realm, had been sought after for a long time, but aside from the wonder drug for herpetic keratitis known as 5-iodo-2-deoxyuridine (IDU), which was discovered by Herbert E. Kaufman in 1962, no other kinds had been reported, and the clinical effectiveness of drugs being tested was still unproven. The clinical application of a substance that interfered with the growth of viruses, called interferon, was only almost ready to break free of the experimental stage. In other words, in fighting viral infections, there was no choice but to rely on the simple method that had been around since Edward Jenner—namely, to isolate the virus, grow a culture, and make a vaccine.

Moreover, more than four hundred kinds of viruses had been discovered already, and previously unknown species were still being discovered all the time. It was a small matter for new strains to be born from known ones, and there was also plenty of possibility that in the course of producing the next generation a mutant strain might suddenly appear whose nature was completely unpredictable.

Furthermore, that “one more shadow” had a strange nature for a virus and was wearing a disguise. The fact that these were previously unknown new strains, coupled with the difficulties involved in understanding any kind of virus, meant that it took far too long for anyone to realize what was really happening.

There is nothing that we can call it except the result of unfortunate coincidence. Is it possible that so many unfortunate coincidences can pile atop one another?

Usually when something that we call a “major accident” happens, unfortunate coincidences accumulate to a nearly impossible degree, all manner of safety systems fail one after another, and the accident occurs. Go and read about the very first nuclear reactor accident in history in 1952 on Canada’s Chalk River, or about the dam that burst in France. No, even without going that far out of your way, it will be enough to think about some big train derailment that is still fresh in your memory.

Even when an accident just barely avoids becoming a terrible tragedy, all is decided by whether the switch of coincidence is turned to the left or the right. This is a very famous story, but in 1957, in the skies above North Carolina, a B-47 bomber on a training flight mistakenly dropped a hydrogen bomb. Luckily, it didn’t explode, but was it not an unfortunate coincidence to mistakenly drop such a dangerous weapon on a fertile and densely populated eastern state? Further, it was later uncovered that of the six layers of safety apparatus for preventing accidental detonation, five had been out of order, and the only thing that had prevented the bomb from going off had been that one remaining apparatus. From a numerical point of view, that made six unlucky coincidences, including the mistake of dropping the bomb. Had it been nothing more than good fortune that had prevented the seventh unlucky coincidence that would have brought terrible tragedy? On the other hand, both the world—nature itself—and the idiosyncratic societies humans created always contained dangers such as fire, and later, gunpowder. Wasn’t it just luck when the two failed to meet? Gunpowder by itself is nothing more than another common chemical compound of no danger whatsoever. By itself, it is a gritty powder that gradually deteriorates over time. A match burns with a tiny flame that flickers for only about fifteen seconds. The greatest danger it poses is that you’ll burn your fingers. But when the gunpowder stored in heaps behind the world’s stage coincidentally encounters it …