The
Hot Zone by Richard Preston is a chilling read about one of
the most lethal viruses known to man: Ebola Virus. Written in 1994, after a
trip Preston took to Kenya, the book details the history, most virulent
outbreaks, and future of this biohazard level 4 agent. First seen in 1967, the
virus ravaged a small town in Germany with the virus delivered by an African monkey
importing and exporting trade. Here the virus was named Marburg. By 1989 three
other deadly filoviruses (or wormlike viruses) that cause hemorrhagic fever had
been discovered: Ebola Sudan, Ebola Zaire, and Ebola Reston. Each is named for
the river in the Congo where the virus is thought to have originated (the Ebola
River) and for the place where the first outbreak of the strain occurred. In The Hot Zone, Preston focuses especially
on the emergence of Ebola Reston. This particular strain sprang up in 1989 at
the Reston monkey house in the suburbs of Washington D.C. It was contained by a
quiet, but intense operation supervised by the Army. But with a highly
contagious and vicious agent we can never be sure when or where it will strike
next.
This book is terrifying because of the factual nature of
the horrific events that this virus has caused and because this virus has flown
under the radar, almost unnoticed by most of the world. It is a virus that
combines the worst of the flu, rabies, and AIDS. It is fast mutating and, were
it to become more efficient and airborne, it could wipe out 90% of the human
population on this earth within a year. We would have no time to find a cure or
protect ourselves; we would be entirely at the mercy of nature’s wrath. It
would be a quick and devastating end to civilization as we know it, but most
people do not even know that this threat exists. Scientists too are still in
the dark when it comes to Ebola. They have yet to find its natural host, its origins,
or its inner workings, though there are many theories. This elusiveness only
enhances the power of this virus, exploiting our weaknesses as a society. But it
is also what makes this book so powerful and arresting.
So often we humans play God. We think we have conquered
nature and this planet. We think our civilization will resist all that nature can
throw at us. Yet we are wrong. We are
often reminded that humans are small, fragile, and at the mercy of the planet. We take without considering the consequences
and, as a result, we sometimes unleash nature’s fury. There is a theory (substantiated by a good amount of evidence) that
points to the rainforests in central Africa as the birthplace of AIDS, Ebola,
and many other emerging viruses. But we are destroying these rainforests, these
reservoirs of life, and in the process unleashing these viruses from the jungle
and giving them free reign to terrorize civilization. In the words of Richard
Preston “In a sense the earth is mounting an immune response. . . attempting to
rid itself of an infection by the human parasite.” Perhaps it is time we
rethought our place in this world as subservient to the will of nature and not
as Gods without repercussions. Ebola virus will strike again but when it does,
will we be ready? Or will the human race be destroyed from the inside out, by a
microscopic organism with an insatiable desire to live?
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