Medusa

ANHUI PROVINCE, PEOPLE’S REPUBLIC OF CHINA

THE HELICOPTER DARTED IN FROM NOWHERE AND CIRCLED above the village like a noisy dragonfly. Dr. Song Lee looked up from the bandage she was applying to a cut on the young boy’s arm and watched as the helicopter hovered and then started its vertical descent to a field at the edge of the settlement.

The doctor gave the boy a pat on the head and accepted her payment of half a dozen fresh eggs from his grateful parents. She had treated the wound with soap, hot water, and an herbal poultice, and it was healing nicely. With little in the way of medicine and equipment, the young doctor did the best she could with what she had.

Dr. Lee brought the eggs into the hut and then joined the noisy throng rushing to the field. Excited villagers, including many who had never seen an aircraft up close, completely surrounded the helicopter. Lee saw the government markings on the fuselage and wondered who from the Ministry of Health would be coming to her remote village.

The helicopter door opened and a short, portly man wearing a business suit and tie stepped out. He took one look at the chattering crowd of villagers and an expression of terror crossed his broad face. He would have retreated into the helicopter if Lee had not eased her way through the mob to greet him.

“Good afternoon, Dr. Huang,” she called out in a strong enough voice to be heard above the babble. “This is quite the surprise.”

The man cast a wary eye over the crowd. “I hadn’t expected such a large reception.”

Dr. Lee laughed. “Don’t worry, Doctor. Most of these people are related to me.” She pointed to a couple whose weathered brown faces were wreathed in smiles. “Those are my parents. As you can see, they’re quite harmless.”

She took Dr. Huang by the hand and led him through the swarm of onlookers. The villagers started to follow, but she waved them off and gently explained that she wished to speak to the gentleman alone.

Back at her hut, she offered her visitor the battered folding chair she sat in to treat patients. Huang mopped the sweat off his bald pate with a handkerchief and scraped the mud from his polished leather shoes. She boiled water for tea on a camp stove and poured a cup for her visitor. Huang took a tentative sip, as if he were unsure it was sanitary.

Lee sat down in the patched-up old dining-room chair that the patients used. “How do you like my open-air treatment room? I see my more modest patients inside the hut. Farm animals, I treat on their own territory.”

“This is a far cry from Harvard Medical School,” Huang said, gazing in fascination at the hut, with its walls of mud and thatched roof.

“This is a far cry from anywhere,” Lee said. “There are some advantages. My patients pay me in vegetables and eggs, so I never go hungry. The traffic is not as bad as in Harvard Square, but it’s next to impossible to find a good caramel caffe latte.”

Huang and Lee had met years before at a mixer for Asian students and faculty at Harvard University. He was a visiting professor from China’s National Laboratory of Medical Molecular Biology. She was finishing her graduate studies in virology. The young woman’s quick wit and intelligence had impressed Huang immediately, and they had continued their friendship after returning to China, where he had risen to a high position in the ministry.

“It has been a long time since we talked. You must be wondering why I’m here,” Huang said.

Dr. Lee liked and respected Huang, but he had been among a number of highly placed colleagues who were conspicuously absent when she needed someone to speak out on her behalf.

“Not at all,” Lee said with a note of haughtiness. “I expect that you are probably carrying the apology of the authorities for their heavy-handed treatment of me.”

“The state will never admit that it is wrong, Dr. Lee, but you have no idea how many times I have regretted not standing up in your defense.”

“I understand the government’s tendency to blame everyone but itself, Dr. Huang, but you have no idea how many times I have regretted that my colleagues failed to come to my defense.”

Huang wrung his hands.

“I don’t blame you,” he said. “My silence was a clear act of cowardice. I cannot speak for my colleagues. I can only offer my most humble apologies for not defending you in public. At the same time, I did work behind the scenes to keep you out of jail.”

Dr. Lee resisted the temptation to show the doctor the harsh conditions in the impoverished village. He would soon learn that a jail didn’t need bars. She decided that it would be unfair to pick on Huang. Nothing he could have done would have changed the outcome.

She forced a smile.

“Your apology is accepted, Dr. Huang. I am truly pleased to see you. Since you do not bear the thanks of a grateful nation for my service, what are you doing here?”

“I come as the bearer of bad news, I’m afraid.” Although they were alone, he lowered his voice. “It has returned,” he said in a near whisper.

Lee felt an icy coldness in the pit of her stomach.

“Where?” she asked.

“To the north of here.” He rattled off the name of a remote province.

“Have there been any other outbreaks?”

“None so far. It is an isolated area, thank goodness.”

“Have you isolated the virus to confirm its identity?”

He nodded. “It’s a coronavirus, as before.”

“When was it first detected? And have you found its source?”

“About three weeks ago. No source yet. The government immediately isolated the victims and quarantined the villages to prevent its spread. They are taking no chances this time. We are working with the World Health Organization and the U.S. Centers for Disease Control.”

“That’s quite different from the last response.”

“Our government learned its lesson,” Huang said. “Their secrecy regarding the SARS epidemic damaged China’s reputation as an emerging world power. Our leaders know that secrecy is not an option this time.”

The Chinese government had come under international fire because it kept the first SARS epidemic secret from the world, causing a delay and slowing treatment that could have prevented a number of deaths. Song Lee was working as a teaching physician in a Beijing hospital when the epidemic broke out. She suspected it was serious and assembled the facts to make her case. When she urged her superiors to take action, they warned her to stay silent. But the World Health Organization’s outbreak-alert system issued a global warning. Travel came to a halt and quarantines were enforced. An international lab network isolated a virus never before found in humans. The disease was called SARS, short for severe acute respiratory syndrome.

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.