Bat out of Hell

by Alan Gold

  “Let me tell you what it is that we’re going to be doing. As I’ve said, ladies and gentlemen, during the past four or five years, we’ve had a series of sudden and unprecedented eruptions of viruses not previously seen before in human beings; some have for the first time, crossed the species border, meaning that those diseases that affected other animals are now mutating to affect human beings. We were first warned about this when gay men began dying in the US, but we were unaware then of the ways in which viruses could cross the species boundaries. It took us years to understand the nature of the HIV virus, and even now, we’re only coming to grips with its treatment, not yet its cure. As to the source of the virus, we still don’t really know.

  “The HIV virus that causes AIDS could be, probably was, one such issue, and we all know how that has devastated so many of our brothers and sisters. SARS is another, as is the influenza A subtype virus H5N1, better known as avian or bird flu. There’s the deadly Hendra virus that spreads from horses to humans, the Ebola virus that so recently killed thousands of people in West Africa, and a whole raft of other diseases that so far have only killed a relatively small number of people.

  “Small, that is, until recently. We’re now recognizing that primates were probably the vector of HIV, which spread to humans, but while we know they acted as a reservoir, we don’t know what caused the primate HIV virus to infect them. And we know that pigs were the source of the virus that wiped out the entire populations of five villages on Indonesian islands and others in the jungles of Malaysia and Thailand during the past year, but what suddenly gave it to the pigs? Villagers in Indonesia and Malaysia and Thailand have been eating pork for millennia, yet suddenly something in pork is instantly fatal to human beings.

  “What is of greatest concern to us is how the disease gets into the higher animals. Ticks, perhaps, mosquitoes possibly, fleas, birds, bats . . . who knows? That’s what our brightest minds are currently working on . . . because if we can wipe out the source of infection for higher and often domesticated animals, then we can stop the spread of the disease to humans. Yes, scientists throughout the world are working on vaccines to prevent people from falling sick if they’re unlucky enough to be infected by the virus, but as all of you scientists and health professionals here know only too well, viruses can mutate quickly, and any vaccine will be largely ineffective against some new strain that mutates when it enters a new host. So just like the Great Fire of London cleansed the congestion and conditions that had created fertile ground for the Black Plague, our team of biohazard scientists will be like a cleansing firestorm, identifying the source of infection, eliminating it, quarantining any infection, and preventing the spread into our cities, our homes. Unlike our tragic ancestors in England in 1666, we won’t allow entire populations to fall foul of some new and monstrous disease. When we identify the source, whether it’s mosquitoes, ticks, bats, birds, or whatever, we’ll eliminate it before it has a chance to infect large numbers of human beings.”

  ***

  When the US presidential address to the World Health Organization Annual Conference was over, the VIPs were escorted to their cars and driven to the Quirinal Palace, where the Italian president was waiting to greet the visiting US party. Debra drove to the Italian president’s residence in the limousine along with DeAnne Harper, the United States secretary of Health and Human Services; her husband; and Deputy Secretary Doctor Jonathan Bailey. The president of the United States, along with his wife, was riding in a heavily protected convoy with the Italian Prime Minister Doctor Angelo LoPresti.

  Away from prying microphones, Doctor Bailey said, “Well what did we all make of the reception to the president’s speech?”

  Debra was inclined to give her opinion but had been warned both by her boss in Atlanta, and in a whispered conversation with Doctor Bailey just before she got into the limo, to allow the secretary the floor whenever possible. She was arrogant and a merciless self-promoter, but she had the ear of the president, and it wouldn’t do to get on her wrong side. So Debra held back.

  “I think it went over very well,” said Secretary Harper. “Face it, after all of these hideous, sudden outbreaks in Indonesia, Malaysia, Thailand, the Sudan, Somalia, Benin, and Brazil, the Third World is running scared. And when China was the first to come on board, it was game, set, and match for the developing world. After the Ebola epidemic in West Africa, it was obvious to them that they could see half their populations destroyed, and when you don’t have the resources to fight such disasters, you have to rely on a big brother. Sure, most people there today realized that we’re doing this to protect ourselves, but they were also smart enough to realize that while we’re protecting ourselves, we’re also protecting them. No, I think it went very well. A good speech.”

  “You know, Madam Secretary, much of the content of the speech was provided by Debra,” said Doctor Bailey.

  DeAnne turned and acknowledged the younger woman. She smiled. “I’m really glad to have you on board, Doctor Hart. I just hope that you and your team can meet our expectations.”

  “We’ll certainly try to, Madam Secretary. But you know how difficult it is, sometimes, to find the cause of a sudden viral infection,” Debra said, not wanting to sound too defensive.

  “What worries me most,” said the secretary, “is if one of these horrible diseases gets into a city. In the countryside, even in the Third World, it can often be quarantined and contained; that’s why Ebola didn’t spread from Liberia and those other countries. And when a few doctors and nurses brought it back, we were able to contain it quickly. But we all know what happened when AIDS got into the wider community of San Francisco. It had devastated the gay population of the West Coast, New York, Chicago, and other major cities before we managed to get a handle on HIV. I stay awake at night terrified that one of these viruses will cross species and find its way into the heart of our homeland. God knows, Ebola and SARS are terrible enough, but they’re usually in some African jungle or in China or somewhere far away from us. I read that paper you sent to me, written by that Harvard scientist; you remember, the one on bats and their viral load . . . is that a reality?” the secretary asked.

  Debra nodded. “It’s still speculative, but with bats now inhabiting inner cities, it’s something that I think we should become very serious about researching.”

  ***

  Debra stationed herself against one of the walls of the reception hall while watching the president of the United States being introduced to Italian, European Union, and other high-ranking health ministers and their departmental officials. Quirinale Palace contained one of the most sumptuous rooms in which she’d ever been, at least under these circumstances.

  Along with her widowed mother, she’d taken the occasional holidays to the beauty and culture spots of Europe; she’d been inside the Vatican, Windsor Castle, and all over Vienna’s Schonbrunn Palace, but only ever as a tourist, hurried by guides, prevented by guards. For the first time in her life, she was within a historic building as an invited guest, with rights to touch the priceless objects, sit on the opulent furniture, and drink wine with the residents. And there were fewer more opulent or sumptuous palaces in Europe than the Quirinale.

  Built in 1573 by Pope Gregory XIII as his summer residence, it had served popes, both as the site for their conclaves and as home and offices for the Papal States until 1870 when the hapless Pius IX lost them. Then it became a royal residence for the King of Italy and now housed the president of the Italian Republic.

  The steps leading up to the palace from the Via del Quirinale had impressed her greatly, and as the car drove toward the palace, she could barely wait to be deposited at the foot of the stairs so that the tourists would look and gawk and give her the feeling of being like the Queen of England. Would she turn and wave . . . no, she’d let them guess who she was.

  But her girlish fantasy evaporated as the driver, naturally, drove around the palace to a secure entrance. She felt stupid for even thinking that the president of the Un
ited States would get out of a limo on the pavement like some Hollywood hunk at a movie premier, walk up the stairs through a gaggle of sightseers, and shake hands with the president of the Italian Republic when he reached the top.

  It was when she had alighted from her car, following the secretary of health into the palace, that she truly understood Gibbon’s expression . . . the glory that was Greece, and the grandeur that was Rome. She’d never, ever been invited to be a guest somewhere as grand, as magnificent, as plush. Having spent her life in universities, laboratories, functional government buildings, and purposeful offices, being inside a venerable European palace and surrounded by the wealth of former ages and offered wine and canapés by liveried flunkies in powdered wigs was an experience she would find hard to define either to her future self or her family.

  She had been escorted and announced as she entered the reception hall, where the president of the Italian Republic and his wife and the Italian prime minister and his wife greeted her at the door. The prime minister kissed the hand of the secretary of health but shook Debra’s hand. And so she’d entered the inner sanctum where she and five hundred other guests were gathered. The vastness of the room gave her the feeling of being one of few, rather than part of a crowd, and she gravitated toward one of the walls where she stood nursing her glass and observing how people who felt completely at ease in such surroundings behaved.

  One she observed was the president of the United States. She’d never met him until this afternoon, but had been at Health and medical receptions when he’d been a guest and found him, from afar, to be intelligent, personable, and comfortable within himself. Her opinion of him was that he was neither as arrogant as Bill Clinton nor as ignorant as George W. Bush but a brilliant orator in the style of Barack Obama. President Thomas was the first man with a doctorate in a scientific discipline to be elected to serve his people from the White House; already well into the beginning of his term, he was elected with a very comfortable majority over a born-to-rule Bostonian whose campaign never recovered from the photographs of him making a drunken fool of himself with a Fox News female reporter.

  Debra was impressed by the facility with which her president sashayed from one conversation to another, immediately finding a thread in a conversation that involved the person meeting him, often for the first time. Attempting to read his lips from a distance, he seemed to be saying immediately after the introduction, “Yes, I know the city where you come from. I was there four years ago . . .” or “Good to meet you at last because I was just saying to my cabinet colleagues that we really should see more of you in the White House.”

  It was practiced small talk, a skill at which she was an utter incompetent. When she was at scientific conferences, she and her colleagues wouldn’t indulge in small talk but would rather come straight to the point about this virus or that research.

  She was brought back to the moment when she saw that a man was suddenly standing next to her, appearing out of nowhere like a faithful retainer. She turned and looked at an elegant European—suntanned, brown hair graying at the temples, in his mid-fifties but still obviously immensely healthy, probably athletic from regular ski holidays in the Swiss Alps.

  “Doctor Hart, I am Professor Enrico Maria Giulini. I head up the virology unit of the University of Rome.”

  She held out her hand, and he clasped it to his lips and kissed it. She was touched and felt a ridiculous frisson of excitement.

  “May I say, Doctor Hart, that there has never been a mission more important than that with which you have been entrusted. Without wishing to sound like some adolescent hysteric, the very future of vast numbers of the human race is at stake, and our authorities have failed to realize this until now. For years, I have been warning my government of the potential of widespread infections from these new strains of viruses, but I have been marginalized by low-level bureaucrats as a scaremonger. Now your president makes an announcement, your secretary of health joins him, the United Nations and other world bodies come on board, and my government rushes to catch up. Suddenly I get urgent phone calls to see the minister to explain what I’ve been trying to get him to understand for years. I’m criticized by my government that I didn’t think of your initiative before you did and that thanks to my incompetence, Italy is playing second fiddle to the United States. Ridiculous.”

  She burst out laughing. “I’m sorry, but that’s all really so stupid, isn’t it? It sounds like just the sort of thing that happens in the United States.”

  “Very stupid. But at least we have some action now. If there’s anything you need, anything which Italy or my university can assist you with, please don’t hesitate to ask. Thanks to you, I’m now being listened to in high places. Who knows, I might even get some equipment I’ve been begging for these past ten years.”

  She was warming to this gentle man. Elegant, sophisticated, handsome even, he reminded her of her father . . . the father she knew and loved before he caught AIDS from one of his lovers.

  ***

  Possibly, it was her laughter at the Italian professor’s jokes that caused the president of the United States to turn and look at her. Possibly, it was the simple fact that the conversation time he’d allotted to the German minister of health had run out, and the president was getting bored with all the facts and figures being aimed at him as though they were V-2 rockets. Or possibly it was one of the myriad of hidden signals—a scratch of the left ear, a surreptitious turn of the right elbow—that caused the president’s press secretary to approach him, excuse himself most sincerely, and guide the president away from the rigidly boring minister.

  For some reason, the press secretary, whose face was almost as familiar as the president’s from the daily press briefings he gave in the West Wing, escorted the president over close to where Debra was standing, talking animatedly to Professor Giulini. Without bothering to wait for their conversation to enter a natural break, mid-sentence, the press secretary said, “Excuse me Doctor Hart, Professor, the president would like to speak with you.”

  With well-oiled mechanical timing, the president glided into the group, held out his hand and said, “Doctor Hart, I’ve heard so much about you. It’s good to meet with you at last. Professor, I wonder if you could spare Doctor Hart for just a short time.”

  The press secretary gently took the Italian by his arm and led him to the buffet table, chatting amiably all the way, as though the conversation they had just begun had been taking place for hours. Debra was amazed by the fluidity with which the short but intense maneuver had just been carried out. Nobody had been offended, nobody felt ignored, yet she was free for a conversation with the president. And she knew that as soon as what he needed to say or find out had been satisfied, he’d glide off to someone and somewhere else and she’d be left alone, wondering what just happened.

  “So Doctor Hart, you’re our new virus fighter,” he began. “Quite a job.”

  She wanted to say that it was daunting but that she was well up to the task. However, her throat suddenly closed up and she was rendered speechless. She suddenly realized that she was standing inches away from Nathanial Jefferson Thomas, the most powerful man in the world, an intellectual and political giant, a mountaineer and scientist, a business leader and author of two well-received political and philosophical tracts, a man even the most jaundiced media compared to Teddy Roosevelt. And Debra turned her mind to making comparisons between the hapless President Bush, the rutting President Clinton or the emasculated President Obama; it seemed to her that the new man in the White House was being treated like a god by the media. Now she was standing next to him, touching his shoulder, and all she could gasp was a ridiculous, “Yes, sir, big job.”

  She tried to free her mind of its frozen state by concentrating on the fact that she wasn’t standing next to her president, but some new boss. Yet it wasn’t easy. By any accounts he was an extraordinary man. Not only was he a brilliant scientist before entering politics, he’d made a fortune as head of a multi-billion
dollar clean water facility taking sludge from around the country and using microbes both to turn it into drinking water and generate enough electricity to power a dozen small towns. Nathanial Jefferson Thomas was a natural leader of men, one who had come into politics in the middle of his life, stood for congress, and was drafted into the vice presidency in his second term. When, in the middle of his presidency, the incumbent had been forced to step aside because he’d developed early-onset Alzheimer’s, Nathaniel had taken over the presidency and had recently won the next election in his own right. He was a Renaissance man, but she hadn’t voted for him because she was a lifelong Democrat and he was a Republican. Now that she could see close up how gorgeous he was, she regretted her political leanings. Like millions of other young women in America, she’d suddenly fallen for him like an adolescent teen. She knew she had to get a grip on herself, and bit the inside of her cheek.

  “Have you got your team together yet?” he asked.

  “Some,” said Debra, recovering her composure and her voice. “I’ve got a top-line bat biologist from Harvard, some virologists and bacteriologists from Oxford, a wonderful geneticist from Tel Aviv, an epidemiologist from Paris, and I think I’m going to ask the Italian gentleman I was just speaking to if he’d join the rapid response team . . . from the work he was telling me about, he seems just what I need.”

  The president nodded in approval. “I’m not one to interfere because I’m a firm believer in the checks and balances of the separation of powers, but I wonder if I could impose upon you to see if there are any African or Asian or Arab scientists who you could incorporate. I realize, Debra, that the scientific skills you require in your team are far more important than the culture or nationality of the scientists you’re choosing, but it would be very useful politically to my administration and its relationship with the WHO and the UN if some scientists on the team could come from these blocs. If the team is exclusively composed of Americans and Europeans . . . well, I’m sure you understand the sensitivities.”