Typical Day
"Have you had any recent contact with camels?" Richard asks from behind his clipboard. The dim hospital lighting makes reading his form difficult, and for the first time since traveling to the Arabian Peninsula, he questions the wisdom of the World Health Organization. Is there ever a reason to print forms in 8pt font?
His translator, Yaseen, asks Richard's question to the man in the cot. His name is Wal, and he's mid-treatment for what's been temporarily labeled "APPV," the slow-spreading respiratory syndrome that Richard was sent here to track.
It's uncommon for someone who doesn't speak the native language well to be sent as a vanguard of canvassing efforts, but Richard is particularly qualified to create the initial report. His grad thesis was an analysis of early distribution models of MERS, the most similar viral illness to APPV currently observed.
"Yes," Wal responds in English.
"Can you describe your contact with the camels, please?" Richard asks. Yaseen translates. "
He doesn't understand," Yaseen says.
Richard sighs. It's not the man's fault; the question was vague.
"Urine, feces...has he had physical contact or ingested either substance?" Richard asked dryly.
Wal seems offended by Yaseen's translation, but cools quickly and answers the question calmly.
"No," he says. "Only feed."
"You give them their food?" Richard asks, miming the action with his hands. There was no need for Yaseen to translate.
"Yes, food," Wal replies. "My job."
Richard marks a checkbox on his form and finishes the interview. There were precious few cases accurately reported as APPV—most are still misdiagnosed or written off by the infected as mere flu—so when someone like Wal appears, it's extremely important to gather as much information as possible. Now, everyone with whom Wal works or had close contact with is an excellent next step for tracking the illness to its source, thereby creating a forecast model of its potential spread.
Richard thanks the man, leaving the hospital for the offices of Wadi Rum Tours, Wal's employer. He looks at his watch as he jumps into the passenger seat of Yaseen's jeep. Wadi Rum Tours runs camel tours through the desert—not exactly an attraction designed for the locals. If the company is dealing with international tourists, there's an increased risk of APPV leaving the Peninsula.
Richard eats lunch on the way, and arrives at the tour office half an hour later. The owner is there, and appears cooperative, though uneasy of WHO's presence at his business. Richard does his best to calm the man down, promising to keep his investigation as quiet as his responsibilities allow.
He's led to the stables, where he prepares a mobile test kit. Yaseen helps him collect samples from the animals, but progress is slow. Twenty animals and an hour later they're finally ready for the next step.
They walk back to the car and open the trunk, removing a large case of glass vials filled with clear liquid. Richard carefully combines the samples and vials while Yaseen writes quick labels with a pen and roll of masking tape.
"It's not exactly the lab, is it?" Yaseen says, wiping the sweat from his eyebrows with the back of his wrist. Richard looks at him briefly and chuckles.
While they wait the twenty minutes for the solution to settle, they interview the owner and ask for any customer logs Wadi Rum Tours may have kept. The owner refuses, but eventually agrees to release them if his customers are at direct risk, not just part of some "flimsy excuse to collect people's phone numbers." Richard does his best to convince the man of his intentions, but admits that there's no evidence pointing toward a dangerous outbreak. At least not yet.
He walks back to the car trunk and looks at the samples. "Not one of them blue," he says, his hands planted firmly on his hips.
"And that means?" Yaseen asks.
"Either all of the sample vials were rendered ineffective by the conditions out here, or the camels had nothing to do with it." Richard kicks a small rock. "Probably the latter, though." The news disappoints him. He was sure that camels were involved in transmission, but as fate would have it, perhaps not in this particular case.
Richard thanks the owner before leaving, and then drives back into town to begin canvassing Wal's neighborhood. If the man didn't catch APPV from work, then there was a good shot that someone else he's contacted gave him the illness. Camels are so much easier than humans, he thought, as he knocked on the door of Wal's aunt's apartment.
The sun drops an hour later, and though Richard could work for another five hours or more, the late time meant he was at risk of making people uncooperative or agitated by bothering them after dark. He says goodbye to Yaseen and travels back to his small room at the WHO office to spend dinner sifting through his research, looking for a pattern. Three hours pass, and he's got two potential models he'll follow up on in the morning.
He turns on the TV, and clicks through channels until finding one in English. It's not long before he's fallen asleep.