THE HOT ZONE

“The Hot Zone” by Robert Preston



“The Hot Zone” by Richard Preston

Introduction

Richard Preston's book “The Hot Zone” informs us about the “filovirus” story, from the first documented spate of the “Marburg virus” in Yugoslavia and Germany in 1967 to Preston's journey beside Africa's “AIDS freeway” to the Mount Elgon which is on the border between Uganda and Kenya, in the 1993 summer. People who start reading the The Hot Zone might find it hard to recognize that the book is not a science fiction but authenticated scientific reality. This paper discusses “the Hot Zone” by Robert Preston.

Discussion

Charles Monet, a 56 yearas old expatriate Frenchman residing in the west of Kenya. He is enjoying the Christmas vacation on “Mount Elgon”. After the vacations, seven days later, Monet is racked with pain. His eyeballs and head ache so monumentally that he stays home from work. Aspirin does not relieve the headache. Soon Monet develops a throbbing backache as well. By the third day of his illness, he is running a fever and vomiting, finally bringing up no solids or fluids but continuing to have dry heaves. He sinks into an uncharacteristic passivity. His face becomes masklike; his eyelids droop. His eyeballs, looking ready to pop, redden; his skin yellows and develops red blotches.

When some of his fellow workers look in on him, it is apparent to them that he needs to be rushed to the hospital at Kisumu, on the shore of Lake Victoria. His illness baffles the physicians there, who give him antibiotics to no avail. They recommend that he go to Nairobi Hospital, the best medical facility in that part of Africa.

Although he is becoming increasingly ill, Monet boards a jammed Kenya Airways flight to Nairobi. During the flight, he becomes violently ill, vomiting into a sickness ...