Medusa

The virus spread to more than two dozen countries on several continents, infecting more than eight thousand people. Almost a thousand died, and a pandemic of worldwide proportions was narrowly averted. The Chinese government imprisoned the doctor who had told the world that the cases were being under-reported and that patients were being driven around in ambulances to keep them away from the World Health Organization. Others who had tried to expose the cover-up also became targets. One of them was Dr. Song Lee.

“Secrecy wasn’t an option then, either,” she reminded Huang, making no attempt to keep the heat out of her voice. “You still haven’t told me what this has to do with me.”

“We are assembling a research team and want you to be on it,” Huang said.

Lee’s anger spilled out.

“What can I do?” she asked. “I am simply a country doctor who treats life-threatening diseases with herbs and voodoo.”

“I implore you to put your personal feelings aside,” Huang said. “You were one of the first to detect the SARS epidemic. We need you in Beijing. Your combined expertise in virology and epidemiology will be invaluable in developing a response.” Huang folded his hands together as if in prayer. “I will get down on my knees to beg, if you wish.”

She gazed at his anguished face. Huang was brilliant. She could not expect him to be valiant as well. Softening her voice, she said, “It won’t be necessary to beg, Dr. Huang. I will do what I can.”

His round face lit up.

“Mark my words,” he said, “you won’t be sorry for your decision.”

“I know I won’t,” Lee said, “especially after you meet my conditions.”

“What do you mean?” Huang asked in a guarded tone.

“I want enough medical supplies to take care of this village for six months . . . No, make that a year, and expand it to encompass the villages around this one.”

“Done,” Huang said.

“I have established a network of midwives, but they need a trained professional to oversee them. I want a family-practice physician flown in here this week to take over my practice.”

“Done,” Huang repeated.

Lee chided herself for not demanding more.

“How soon do you need me?” she asked.

“Now,” Huang said. “The helicopter is waiting for you. I would like you to speak at a symposium in Beijing”

She did a quick mental inventory. The hut was on loan. Her belongings could fit into a small valise. She would have to inform only the village elders and bid her aged parents and her patients a quick good-bye. Standing, she extended her hand to seal the bargain.

“Done,” she said.

THREE DAYS LATER, Dr. Lee stood on a podium behind a lectern at the Ministry of Health in Beijing, steeling herself to address more than two hundred experts from around the world. The woman on the podium bore no resemblance to the country doctor who had delivered babies and piglets by candlelight. She wore a pin-striped business suit over a blouse of Chinese-flag red, a rose silk scarf encircling her neck. A touch of makeup had lightened the amber complexion that had been darkened by outdoor life. She was grateful that no one could see her callous palms.

Soon after she had arrived in Beijing, Lee had gone on a shopping spree, courtesy of the People’s Republic of China. At the first shop, she tossed her cotton jacket and slacks in the trash. With each subsequent purchase, in some of Beijing’s most fashionable boutiques, she redeemed a bit of her lost self-respect.

Song Lee was in her mid-thirties, but she looked younger. She was slender, with small hips and breasts, and long legs. While her figure was adequate but unremarkable, it was her face that inevitably turned heads for a second look. Long dark lashes shaded alert, questing eyes, and full lips alternated between a friendly smile and a slight, more serious pucker when she was deep in thought. Working in the country, she had tied her long jet-black hair in a loose ponytail and tucked it under a cap that may have belonged to a foot soldier on Mao’s Long March. But now it was styled and cut short.

Since arriving in Beijing, Lee had attended a dizzying schedule of briefings and had been impressed at the swift reaction to the latest outbreak. In contrast to the slow response several years before, hundreds of investigators and support staff had been mobilized around the world.

China was taking the leading role in the fight against the outbreak and had invited experts to Beijing to demonstrate its robust reaction. The speedy response had revealed a silver lining to a serious situation: everyone she talked to seemed confident that basic health practices could contain the SARS outbreak while researchers continued to look for the source and develop a diagnostic test and an appropriate vaccine.

But while the mood was upbeat, Dr. Lee was unable to share their confidence. She was worried that no source of the virus had been found. The civets that had carried the original SARS strain had been wiped out, so maybe the virus had jumped to another host-dogs, chickens, insects-who knew? Also, the Chinese government’s uncharacteristic transparency bothered her as well. Bitter experience had taught her that the authorities did not easily give up their secrets. Even so, she might have dismissed these qualms had not the government refused to let her visit the province that had been infected. Too dangerous, she was told, the province was under the strictest quarantine possible.

Dr. Lee had set her suspicions aside for now to focus on the daunting prospect of appearing before an audience of sharp-minded experts. Her heart thumped madly in her chest. She was nervous about speaking in public after spending years among people whose greatest concern was the rice yield. The computer programs now available to chart an epidemic not only baffled her, she was unsure of her own expertise as well. She felt like a Stone Age holdover thawed from a glacier after ten thousand years.

On the other hand, practicing medicine at its most basic level had given her a gut instinct that was more valuable than all the charts and tables in the world. Her intuition was telling her that it was too early to celebrate. As a virologist, she had respect for how fast a virus could adapt to change. As an epidemiologist, she knew from painful experience how an outbreak could quickly get out of control. But maybe she was just gun-shy. She had gone over the statistics Huang had given her, and the epidemic seemed to be on the road to being contained.

Dr. Lee cleared her throat and looked out at the audience. Some of the people waiting for her to speak were aware of and possibly responsible for her exile, but she swallowed her bitterness.

“To paraphrase the American writer Mark Twain, rumors of my professional demise have been greatly exaggerated,” she said with a straight face.

She let the ripple of laughter roll over her.

“I must admit, I come to you humbled,” she continued. “Since I established my rural practice, great strides have been made in the world of epidemiology. I am impressed at the way the nations of the world have come together to fight this new outbreak. I am proud of the role my country has taken in leading the effort.”

She smiled at the applause. She was learning to play the game. Those wanting angry denunciations of past policy would be disappointed.

“At the same time, I must warn against complacency. Any epidemic contains the seeds of a pandemic. These pandemics have come to us in the past, and human beings have always come out the worse for it.”

She talked about the great plagues in history, starting with the first recorded pandemic that struck Athens during its war with Sparta. The Roman pandemic of 251 A.D. had killed five thousand people a day, the Constantinople epidemic of 452 ten thousand a day. Around twenty-five million died in Europe of the Black Death during the 1340s, and forty to fifty million worldwide in the great influenza epidemic of 1918. She repeated her warning against complacency, and repeated how pleased she was at the multinational response to the current epidemic.