Edmund Fung

Demon in the Freezer Questions

1.
WHO-They ruled to keep all the patients out of hospitals so it doesn’t
spread. This is because the virus can spread very easily in a hospital
since all patients have a disadvantage due to the cause that took them
to the hospital. Hospitals are amplifiers of variola. From the hospital, it
can go out to different parts of the world. WHO would like all the
infected to stay in their own houses and basically let them die. Since
the doctors cannot really do much, there is no use of associating a
doctor with the patient. The WHO also have a stockpile of million of
doses of smallpox vaccine in downtown Geneva.
Germans-The Germans wanted to vaccinate everyone who may have
contact or not with a special German vaccine. The WHO highly
objected and said that the German vaccine was out dated and unless.
Therefore, the WHO urge the Germans to use the WHO smallpox
vaccine in conjunction with the German vaccine. Their tactic was the
ring-vaccination. This is where everyone around the area with smallpox
is vaccinated so that the virus has no where to go.
Smallpox Eradication Program-This program is led by the Soviet
Union. The WHO donated most of their vaccine to this program. The
vaccine is a poxvirus which is closely related to a smallpox virus.
Although the people who gets this vaccine may get sick and very few
die, they do get immunity for a week or so.

Personally, I would go with the Germans. Firstly, their ring-vaccination

idea has worked. In the book, it mentions Foege who used the ring-
vaccination idea in Nigeria and it worked; choking off the virus.
Secondly using vaccines seems more ethnical than letting people die.

2.
FBI-The FBI hindered USAMRIID by using up the reference labs to do
forensic evidence for bioterror event. In the same case, the FBI would
work with the USAMRIID together to solve the mystery. Another way
the FBI hindered USAMRIID was that the Army confirms that the
anthrax powder was extremely fine and dangerous, but Kuhlman from
the FBI was claiming that the powder was ten to fifty times less
dangerous than the USAMRIID confirmed. The argument at the meeting
heated up very quickly.
CIA-The CIA helped USAMRIID by getting control of the Jackson-
Ramshaw paper that was published. This is because it seemed like a
vulnerability to the government’s plans to assemble a stockpile of
vaccine. CIA didn’t really hinder, but they didn’t provide much help.
This is because since the bioweapon program ended in 1969, the CIA
has lost much of its biology knowledge.
CDC-Only CDC had the smallpox virus other than Russia. This is where
USAMRIID got their right to use the virus on monkeys and this is where
they got the actually virus. They helped USAMRIID by letting them
study smallpox and to do test on them. But for them to use it, they
must prove that they can make a vaccine for it. This is why USAMRIID
tested smallpox on the monkeys. The first time they failed. The CDC
hindered the USAMRIID by not letting then test for a while. At last,
USAMRIID go their test through.

3.
The Amerithrax was made to solve the bioterrorest issues. Other than
the 5 homicides, there were a couple more important items.
Amerithrax split in the 1 and 2. 1 was classic detective style. 2 was
more of the scientific style. Murch also said that the classic detective
work would solve the issue, not the fancy science stuff. During
research they believe that the mails were probably sent using Opsecs.
Opsec is operation security. This is where the actual lead doesn’t do
anything but lead. The leader will hire random other people to do the
actual work therefore the real leader can never be traced back.

4.
Bacchus is a program lead by the CIA and it was a secret program. This
purpose was to see if terrorist could be able to buy ordinary equipment
and make anthrax with it without being known. Yes, they accomplished
it but making a surrogate not the real anthrax. They made BT. Its
similar to Amerithrax because they both deal with terrorist making
anthrax. In ways it help Amerithrax because it prove that terrorist
were able to produce anthrax without being known. The difference was
that Bacchus was just an experiment and alone it proves nothing other
than that it was possible to make anthrax secretly. But on the other
hand, Amerithrax has a problem to solve on a bigger scale, not just
proving something.

5.
Mr. Hatfill did have a suspicious character. He enjoyed working with
ebola and smallpox at the same time. He also claims he is finding a
possible cure for smallpox. Also he has an equipment which can grow
human tissue to do testing on. The claims that he made which were
not true:
--Never worked in special forces.
--Never got a Ph.D from Rhode University in South Africa.
He was given a national security clearance in 1999. Later he ask for a
higher-level clearance through a application with a back ground check.
In the August of 2001 the government removed all his clearances. 2
months later, the anthrax was mailed.
6.
IL-4 mousepox was engineered by man named Jackson. He was part of
the Co-operative Research Center for the Biological Control of Pest
Animals, in Canberra. They did it because they were trying to sterilize
mice, therefore controlling the population. But instead the result
concluded that 90% of the mice including immune ones were wiped
out. All the scientist did was put in one foreign gene. The IL-4 gene.

7.
In the last few pages of the book, Mark Martinez kept an arm of a 3-4
year old girl. It was an American girl who died of variola major. The
symptoms was that she was covered in smallpox pustules. She died
when the pustules were crusting. The effect to Jarling, Hensley, and the
author was that in the future most of the people would be living in
cities. Therefore with on person with smallpox, it would spread at the
speed of light. Also all three of them realized that complete eradication
was impossible. Eradication from the natural world was possible but
not from the hands of humans.

8.
Of course I think we can have a resurgence of smallpox in the society
of the USA. Of course actually I China would be hit also just cause they
have so many people. In the USA terrorist would most likely use
smallpox as a bioweapon. This is because smallpox is so easy to
manipulate, just like what it said in the book. You can edit the gene of
the smallpox with a little online training. Not only that, smallpox
transfer easily. Of course there is Ebola, but yet it is hard to control. In
conclusion, I think humans will have a third world war but this time
with bioweapons. Therefore US will be hit with smallpox. Since viruses
can alter, the different kinds of virus work together creating an
unknown virus. Finally the virus wipes out human kind. I always have a
thought that in the cycle of this living earth, it will at one time again be
ruled by viruses and bacteria. Once again going to unicellular. All this
will be sparked by a bio world war starting with our play with smallpox.

9.
When the Jackson-Ramshaw was published it had a small burst of
attention and media. They published it in the Journal of Virology in
February 2001. The reaction was that it was published and spread
throughout the web. The concerns was that the book explained how to
make the virus and explain how they found out and what they found
out. The Australian government said that they should publish it so that
it doesn’t looked like they were making a bioweapon.