The Hot Zone

             " We don't really know what Ebola has done in the past, and we don't know what it might do in the future." (p.49) According to Eugene Johnson, a civilian virus hunter, specializing in Ebola, the essence of the virus itself is one whose existence is still unintelligible to humans. The knowledge of the nature of this virus, as well as Marburg the "gentle sister" of the three filovirus sisters (Ebola Zaire, Ebola Sudan, and Marburg), remains questionable today. In his book, The Hot Zone, Richard Preston shares a horrifying account of the hideous outbreaks of these recognized deadly viruses, in particular the appearance of a lethal virus in the outskirts of Washington, DC.
             It began in October of 1989, when Hazleton Research Products accepted a shipment of a hundred wild monkeys from the Philippines. The monkeys were crab-eating monkeys, a species that resided in the coastal rain forests on the island of Mindanao. They arrived at the Reston monkey house on October 4, with two of which were already dead in their crates. Although this was not an unusual occurrence, Dan Dalgard who was a veterinarian that cared for the monkeys feared that they were dying from Simian Hemorrhagic Fever, a disease lethal to monkeys but harmless to humans. He decided upon the assistance of the United States Army Medical Research Institute of Infectious Diseases (USAMRIID) with the diagnosis of this situation, proceeding the death of a large number of monkeys within a period of a month.
             Thomas Geisbert was an intern at the Institute, who operated the electron microscope, which uses a beam of electrons to make images of smaller objects, such as viruses. Upon the examination of a piece of meat of an infected Reston monkey, he came to the conclusion that they had come across a filovirus, which greatly resembled Marburg. Dr. Peter Jahlring of this Institute followed with a lab testing of the virus culture from the monk
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The Hot Zone. (1969, December 31). In MegaEssays.com. Retrieved 00:54, March 29, 2024, from https://www.megaessays.com/viewpaper/49081.html