The Jupiter Plague

She shuffled through the papers and pulled one out. “Here is the first report from pathology. It has been found impossible to infect human tissue in vitro with infected cells from Commander Rand. They tried this before he died last night. They also found out that they couldn’t pass the virus on to any of the lab animals, monkeys, guinea pigs, rabbits…”

“Then — if it can’t be passed on you and I can leave quarantine! But how could this policeman have been infected?”

“Just a moment and you’ll see. The Rand virus can infect birds, it has taken hold on every species they have tried so far. And then, this is the worst part, the diseased cells from the birds can infect human cells, that’s how poor Frank caught it.”

“Have they tried this on a human volunteer?”

“No, of course not! Just on resected tissue in vitro and HeLa cells.”

Sam was pacing back and forth, unable to stand still.

“It’s like the life cycle in schistosomiasis— from man to snail to man — but that’s a blood fluke, there is no record of a virus propagating this way. Not this one-to-one business with man infecting birds then birds infecting man right back, but no cross infection within the species— wait, can the birds infect one another?”

“Yes, that’s been proven.”

“Then — of course — there’s the next step, that’s why you have the birds here. You want to find out if the human virus will reinfect the birds. If it does, then that means that Frank here and Rand both had the same disease. If they did, once we break the chain of infection it can be wiped out.”

Nita had the hypodermic ready. She reached into the cage and caught one of the birds deftly so that it could not move. It cooed lightly and blinked its pink eyes when the needle slid under its skin: Nita slipped it into another cage and put it into a sealed compartment.

“There’s one thing missing,” Sam said. “Will the virus from the sick policeman infect other human cells; perhaps it has been changed even more by passing through the birds?”

“No, I’ve already checked that. I’m not set up for it here, but I sent samples of biopyoculture from the abscesses down to the sixth floor; they found they didn’t infect human tissue.”

Sam went to inspect his patient, who was sleeping quietly. There was no change, the spread of the disease seemed to have been checked, at least temporarily, though the fever had not gone down. He went back to the lab and sat down across the desk from Nita, who was making notes on a clipboard.

“The lab is beginning to call them Rand-alpha and Rand-beta,” she said. “I suppose that will become the official name.”

“What’s the distinction?”

“Rand-alpha is what Commander Rand had, a deadly virus that cannot be transmitted to man or to any animals other than birds. Rand-beta is the apparently identical virus, it kills the birds and it can be transmitted to man.”

“And it can infect other birds.”

“Yes, very easily, that’s how it spread so quickly.”

“Then the thing to find out now is if Rand-beta when transmitted to man becomes Rand-alpha. If it does our troubles are over. It will mean killing a lot of birds, but we can stop the disease at that stage and stop it from reinfecting human beings.”

“That’s what I’m hoping,” she said, looking at the instruments attached to the bird’s cage. “If the bird gets sick it will have Rand-beta, which means your patient has Rand-alpha — the same as the original case. It will prove that there are only two forms of the disease — and it can only be caught from birds. Once their reservoir of infection is wiped out that will be the end of it.”

They both looked up as the pigeon, stretching out one wing, rolled onto its side.

“It’s body temperature has gone up four degrees,” Nita said.

The first boil formed and they saw that disease was following the now all too familiar course.

“I’ll get a blood specimen down to the lab,” Nita said, “to be checked with the electron microscope. But I don’t think there is any doubt, do you?”

“None at all,” he said as he took a hypodermic needle from the autoclave. “There is only one factor missing from the whole series to prove whether it’s right or wrong.” He turned toward the patient on the bed.

“No! You mustn’t!” Nita shouted, running after him. She grabbed his arm so hard that the hypodermic was jarred from his hand and dropped to the floor. He turned to face her, quietly, without anger.

“Sam, you mustn’t, they were talking about that over at World Health; there were suggestions that they ask for volunteers, but it was decided to wait. It’s too dangerous now, there’s no need…”

“There is a need. Until it is proven that Rand-alpha can’t be transmitted from one person to another we can’t be sure that there won’t be an epidemic. And as long as there is doubt about that I am — both of us are going to be trapped in this isolation ward. Someone will have to be inoculated with the Rand-alpha virus from the policeman here. Since I have already been exposed to Rand-alpha by Rand himself, I’m the logical volunteer. Any arguments?”

“I should—”