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Chinese Murder Mystery. I'd sent this episode to Scott Moyers, my Random
House editor, and he pointed out correctly that it has nothing to do with
smell, but I include it here for fun. It was cut from the chapter "Creation."
As he was writing, he got involved via email in a murder mystery in China.
In April, Stewart had received a mass emailing from a young Chinese Ph.D.
candidate at UCLA studying telemedicine. The mailing concerned a 21-year-old
student in Beijing named Zhu Ling. She had fallen into a coma under
enigmatic circumstances-Stewart forwarded the details to Turin-and as the
doctors were baffled, the UCLA student had list-mailed an Internet all-
points bulletin pleading for help. Turin, fascinated, absorbed the
description, then dropped his Vibration paper for a moment to run and check
out an idea he had. He came back and quickly replied to the entire Zhu Ling
list:
Hello friends
Just got your e-mail via Walter Stewart, and something immediately came to
mind. Has anyone checked whether Zhu Ling is not suffering from *thallium
poisoning* (or possibly some other heavy metal)???.
(Turin had worked with thallium some years ago and had, as he put it, "for
once actually read the safety notice that came with the bottle.")
I just checked with the poison center in London, and they agree. She has all
the classic symptoms: rapid hair loss, neurological problems, no other
understandable signs. Is she a chemist? Could someone have tried to poison
her? If so, the antidote for thallium is prussian blue (ferric
hexacyanoferrate (II)). The dosage is 250mg/kg of body weight per day given
orally in divided doses dissolved in a mannitol solution.
The poison center reports that people have been saved with prussian blue
even after *95 days* on a respirator. If you need any of the reagents, I'd
be happy to send them to you by Fedex as fast as possible. Please send a fax
number so I could get you a data sheet on thallium poisoning.
He enjoyed the sleuthing.
Date: Tue, 25 Apr 1995
To: s******[email protected]
From: l*****[email protected]
Subject: zhu ling
Hi walter! I'm home now, couple of things occurred to me. If Zhu Ling was
poisoned at all, she was poisoned twice (read the description again), and
for all we know whoever poisoned her is by her bedside as we speak. Also,
could you e-mail them to tell them to send a blood sample asap to here, we'
ll have it analysd by the poison centre at Guys' Hospital. We'll pay for it
of course. I finally read their e-mail in detail, and she had an upset
stomach in Dec!! another classic sign. God, I'm praying for the poor girl,
let's hope she pulls through though in all probability her health will be
compromised for ever. I'll check my mail in 3 min or so.
And an hour later:
Reading your e-mail in a hurry, I had missed the fact that Zhu Ling was a *
chemistry student*, which increases the probability of (deliberate or
accidental) poisoning enormously. If she was poisoned, it maybe that whoever
did it gave her two doses, accounting for her getting better and then
relapsing again. Make sure it does not happen again. Send me a blood sample
by Federal Express for thallium analysis, I'll pay for transport and testing
. Do it *FAST*. Remember to give fax and 'phone.
Then silence from China. There was no reply. "Zhu Ling??" queried Stewart.
"Not a peep from anyone," shrugged Turin. "Probably *all* poisoned!"
As he was rewriting the zinc/receptor data, he received from Stewart (23
July 1995, "Subject: Holy living God!!!!!!!!) a forwarded update:
>From: Xin Li
>Medical Imaging Division
>UCLA School of Medicine
>
>Dear friends and doctors:
>
>You, or your friends you consulted with, are among the first 81 persons--
2000 mails from the world, about 18 countries and regions-who made the
correct diagnosis for the 21-year-old Chinese girl student in Beijing! She
did get thallium-poisoning!
>
>This is Xin LI, a Ph.D. student at UCLA working on teleradiology and
telemedicine. As all of you know, I was involved in this case in April. We
did not know so many of you also involved in this case until I came back to
Beijing and met the Beijing university students who sent the SOS message on
>April 10. No words can express the kindness and
>help from such an international community for a 21-year-old girl in far-
away
>China.
>
>It was with the diagnosis from all of you, the patient was finally tested
for thallium at an occupational
>diseases center in Beijing on April 28. Without your contribution, this
test will not even be tried since
>some occupational disease doctors in Beijing had excluded the possibility
of thallium-poisoning
>without even a test.
>
>Her main treatment regimen is Prussian blue together with hemodialysis and
KCl. She is still in coma!
>But according to doctors, the poison has almost been excreted and she is
now in stage of nervous
>restoration. No other treatment but Prussian Blue is being applied now. Her
father told me that she has
>a tiny nervous improvement slowly and gradually.
>
>Thank you very much.
>
>Xin Li
Turin sighed with relief and went back to his paper..... |
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