BLIND TRIAL by Brian Deer (best books to read for beginners TXT) 📗

you recommended him again under ‘any other business,’ as I recall.”

“Me? I recommended him as Vice President, Research, out at Athens. You made him EVP and put him downstairs.”

“That was Dr. Poyser. I went along for a quiet life. And now look where we are.” She swiveled in the chair. “And I’ll tell you something else. If, by some blinding miracle, we scrape through this business, your scholarship scheme is history.”

“I don’t see the connection.”

“Biochemistry degrees, microbiology, pharmacology. That’s what we’ll pay for. Look at this. We’ve got a twenty-six-year-old boy running around with enough information to have everyone arrested and put me on welfare.”

“Yeah, well right, it’s tricky. I see that. But he’ll be okay. The kid’ll come through. Me and him, we’ll do us some talking.”

“And what about this dreadful Sumiko woman?”

“Dr. Honda? Nothing. Doesn’t know jack. Reply forms for SPIRE. Paperclip stuff. Got nothing on the Glinski case at all.”

A MUFFLED rapping interrupted the conversation: knocking on the outer office door. Marcia got up and retreated to the bathroom while Mr. Hoffman admitted Trudy and Ben Louviere.

The sound of running water didn’t mask Trudy’s voice. The Director of Vaccine Development was on the warpath. “So, where is he? Where is he? Where’s that murderer? Is he here? I warned you about that man, that beast.”

Marcia returned to the desk, dabbing her face with a towel. “Now, all in good time. We’re going to call police headquarters and find one of our people there. It’s not easy to raise them over the weekend. But first, let’s sit down for a moment and let’s think of what we’re going to say and, gosh, Mr. Louviere, your face.”

“Accident ma’am. Nothing. Thanks for asking.”

She returned to the window and looked toward west Atlanta, where the sun now touched the horizon. A curtain of cloud was building from the south. AccuWeather forecast rain.

Trudy lowered herself onto the scarlet couch and set down her shoulder purse beside it. “All I want to know is why he did it? Why? That’s the question. Why?”

“All in good time,” Marcia said. “Why hardly matters now. I think we’re beyond that. What matters now is where we are and what we do.”

“Does matter. I’ve thought about this. Alright, it’s true even one case like Helen Glinski would have caused us mighty big problems. Would have lost us a bunch of volunteers. Delay in the results, unquestionably. License delay, too. Unquestionably. But we might still have ironed all that out, given more time.”

Marcia returned to the chair, pulled a lever, leaned back, and shut her eyes. “Unfortunately, time has run out.”

“But we could have done it. Another six, nine months. Look what they accomplished with SARS-Cov-2. For a retrovirus, a year, eighteen months it would have taken us, maximum, to work around the issues. I know it. With an education campaign, fresh counseling at the centers, an adult conversation in the media about risks and benefits, we could’ve taken in the Brazilian data, and still come through—and still been first—if that man hadn’t done what he did.”

“What?” Marcia’s eyes snapped open. “Even with this enhanced progression, deceptive imprinting, whatever it is, thingy?”

“It’s possible.”

“Well, if that’s true, why on earth did he do it? You’re right. Good question. Or do we know something now that he didn’t know then?”

“I don’t know. Maybe nothing. Nothing’s one hundred percent in these things. But we always knew we were on the right track. We have the technology. Nothing justifies what he did.”

“I can’t think what might.”

“With more clinical data, solid black box warnings, supporting studies on high-risk groups, I’m telling you, it’s still a good try for a first product.” Trudy reached into her purse and pulled out a typescript. “Can we get this Xeroxed?”

Ben was dispatched to the outer office to make copies of Wilson et al.

Trudy donned a pair of tortoiseshell glasses. “Now look, I’ve been thinking on the plane. And this could be important.”

When Ben returned, Marcia studied the typescript. To her, it was gibberish. Too many numbers. She preferred to have science explained verbally. She’d risen to the top through Werner Laboratories’ veterinary side, and the vets never asked her to read anything.

Trudy pulled out a pack of cigarettes. “Look, we know we had one very serious adverse reaction in a little over thirteen thousand inoculees on the vaccine arm of the study. Yes? That’s quite an unexceptional figure for a lifesaving pioneer product.”

Mr. Hoffman: “Better than InderoMab.”

Trudy shook a cigarette—a Doral—into her lap. “I wouldn’t know. But if that man hadn’t done what he did, any unfortunates like Helen Glinski could have gotten antiretroviral therapy, as everyone does now. And maybe we could have screened out unsuitable candidates. You know, get some contraindications going.”

The CEO rasped her feet on the carpet. “So, what are you saying? Are you saying, if it wasn’t for Doctorjee, we could have gone ahead, even with what was happening to that poor woman?”

“That’s exactly what I’m saying.”

“But are you sure that’s right? And cleared the DSMB, peer review, FDA, CDC, and the federal advisory panels? I find that hard to believe.”

“That’s my opinion.”

“And what about the anti-vaxxers? They would have screamed blue murder.”

“They would have. But who honestly listens to that mob of crooks, quacks, and stalkers? Philip Crampton could run us a campaign.”

“I find that hard to believe. So you really think we might still have had our vaccine if it wasn’t for what they did?”

“Yes. Yes.” Trudy’s bulk seemed to double. “What he did was worse than murder. It was worse. You look at these figures here.” The vaccine chief’s usual tremor appeared to be fully in remission. “They’re not that bad. Even with the downside, we still get the efficacy and viral load reductions. If you turn to Table 4 here. See?”

Marcia studied a table headed “Breakthrough infections.” The figures had been altered in a tiny scrawl, with several numbers crossed out and replaced.

Trudy lifted the unlit cigarette between her fingers and rested the typescript in her lap.