Sarah’s strong foundation in virology, as well as her extensive experience made it easy for her to assimilate a substantial quantity of information in a short period of time and organize it in her mind.
“I heard that the Soviets used to send old submarines full of nuclear waste up to the North Pole and then sink them there, under the ice, and just leave them. Kind of like a dumping ground. Maybe some of them eroded and the radioactive waste had an effect on the virus?” said Shane, squaring his surprisingly broad shoulders for emphasis.
It was a good point. Shane had made so many immature and sometimes annoying comments in the months that he had been working in her lab, that she often didn’t pay much attention to him, but this comment showed that he was on-topic and attempting to contribute to the conversation. She did not want to squelch his spirit, and furthermore, she was not certain that his hypothesis was that far-fetched. She had seen the journal articles about the tons of nuclear waste that had been unlawfully disposed of beneath the ice. She looked around at the group, but most were staring either at the ground or at the black stone surface of the lab table, lost in thought.
“Well Shane, at this point we know so little about the problem that I think it’s worth it for you to investigate more along those lines,” said Sarah. “Obviously you won’t be able to immerse yourself in that question, but definitely do check it out and see what you can uncover.”
Shane beamed with pride and Sarah thought about how a little thing, a small gesture such as being taken seriously, made such a difference in people’s perception of themselves and others. At five foot five, Shane was the shortest male in the lab. He was also one of the youngest in her group, and she imagined that those two facts were probably the reason that he spent so much time trying to stand out in meetings by saying inappropriate things. She would try to remember that he really did have an intelligent mind when she became annoyed with him the next time. Maybe she could regularly find small ways to affirm him to keep him from becoming too crazy with his ideas.
“Also, and probably most importantly, we don’t have any idea how to stop Laptev. We don’t have a vaccine or any medicines that seem to work,” said Sarah. “It will be next to impossible for us to create an effective vaccine in just six weeks, but if we can at least advance in that direction, come up with some clues as to how the next researchers should proceed, it would be important. Let’s not lose track of this goal, even if we know we cannot accomplish it.”
“The thing is, viruses like Laptev must have been around for thousands of years and no one cared until now,” said Emile. He had the slightest of French accents which came across in an ever so soft rounding of words with the letter “r” so that a word like “viruses” sounded more like “viwuses.”
“They were buried under the ice for thousands of years, not out killing a whole lot of innocent people like they are now,” said Drew.
“But really, they haven’t killed that many people, in the scheme of things. At least, Laptev hasn’t. From what Sarah said, it sounds like a dozen or so, maybe twenty. That’s not that many people. No, that’s not the reason we care more than we cared about HIV when it first started affecting people.” Emile looked around the room, and no one said anything, so he continued. “The real reason we are more concerned now is because this infection is affecting people from first world countries, unlike Ebola. If it were destroying small villages in some remote third world country, we wouldn’t even be looking at taking on this project,” insisted Emile. “And no one would be asking us to drop AIDS research, when HIV affects so many thousands of people, just to take on this tiny outbreak in the Arctic.”
Everyone was quiet for a moment, pondering Emile’s words. Sarah knew that he was right, but she also knew that only independently wealthy labs could afford to study whatever they wanted to study. Organizations like theirs, which depended on money from outside sources, did not have that liberty.
“I have a question,” said Shane, raising his hand and breaking the thoughtful brooding of the team. “Does the infection look all gross when it gets in people, like Ebola? Does it make their organs dissolve in a pool of blood and their eyes get all bulgy and purple and start to bleed…”
“All right, Shane, I think that’s quite enough,” said Sarah, cutting him off quickly. She immediately regretted having allowed him to speak in the first place. She should have known that he was going to say something inappropriate when he raised his hand, as if he were still in high school.
“This isn’t a Hollywood zombie movie, Shane, it’s real life. To answer your question, yes, the physical symptoms are much like those found in Ebola cases, but that’s typical of hemorrhagic fever viruses in general. The fatality rate for Laptev is higher than for Ebola though, at 65%, so let me stress again to all of you how imperative it is to go through BSL-4 training again and adhere strictly to the safety precautions at all times when you are working with this virus.”
Several people nodded soberly and Sarah decided it was time to wrap up the meeting. “All right folks, we don’t have that much time before the transition needs to be complete. Since this new megavirus is so much more contagious than HIV, we have to pack away all of our work and get the lab set up for the new work as quickly as possible. As I just mentioned, safety training will be a priority. Now, I know you all have had that kind of training before, but it’s important that you review all of the safety material. I don’t want to add any of our names to the list of victims out there. Cool?”
“Have they scrubbed down the labs for the conversion yet?” asked Drew, his long legs stretched out and crossed at the ankles, revealing blue socks under his jeans.
“We’ve got a crew coming this afternoon. The labs should be ready to go by tomorrow, I believe. It’s good that this building is so new.”
“When will the first tissue samples arrive?” Tally asked.
“Next Wednesday.”
“Wow, that is really soon,” said Miquela, and then quickly covered her mouth, as if she was embarrassed at having spoken her thought aloud.
“I know,” said Sarah. “We’ve got samples coming in from three different victims. I wish we had more, but they burned the other bodies before anyone thought to sample them.”
“And we will be using human tissues for growing the virus?” asked Emile. It sounded like he had said gwowing the viwus.
“Actually, I’m thinking we can try two different hosts. We’ll use the HeLa line to generate human cells…”
“Gila monster cells? Cool!” said Shane, picking up on the fact that HeLa and Gila had the same pronunciation.
“Not Gila, HeLa, you know, Henrietta Lacks cells?” said Drew.
Shane shook his head. He seemed genuinely puzzled, which made Sarah wonder if his training had been adequate for him to be included in her lab after all. Surely every microbiologist had heard of HeLa cells? They had been around for so many years and had been used so extensively throughout the world.
“It’s an immortal cell line that was developed in the 1950s, wasn’t it?” said Miquela in a quiet voice.
Shane looked at her, a sneer forming on his face. “Well, there’s a gold star for you! So, superman cells to grow the deadly megavirus. Seems fitting, somehow.”
Sarah was about to chastise him when she saw Emile catch Shane’s eye and shake his head slightly in admonition. To her relief, Shane blushed and looked down.
“Yes, Miquela,” said Sarah, as if Shane hadn’t spoken. She was determined not to allow him to belittle a fellow female scientist, and anxious that Miquela not feel like she’d done something wrong by knowing more than Shane did. “Poor Ms. Lacks, may she rest in peace, might not have been too happy to know that her cells live on in perpetuity after her cancer took her so suddenly, but her cells have been extremely helpful for scientists around the world as they grow prodigiously quickly. They have been used for all kinds of research which requires human cells. I believe we used some once in our AIDS research as well?”