Body of Proof: “Going Viral”

Ah, a club. Perfect place for an outbreak. Hmm. Date rape drug?

I’m glad Peter has the sense to recognize the symptoms. But hasn’t he caught whatever it is, at this point, from holding Dani?

It is just too convenient that three new patients show up just as Kate says that there ought to be a lot more sick people. Or maybe I mean, the one person just showed up, but the other two were there before and happened to be in the same isolation unit? That should mean that they recognized the commonalities and did have more sick people — 4 total — and one more person does not suddenly an epidemic make, if 4 didn’t.

They can’t seriously be wearing that protective gear and still be letting their hair down! I mean, at least Kate’s hair is in a reasonable ponytail, but shouldn’t they look more like they’re in surgery, with caps?

Why doesn’t Curtis already see that Ethan has a point? He was Chief ME at some point, so it’s not like he’s some dumb intern or someone without medical training, like Peter.

I feel fairly certain that they don’t have an autoclave there under the bench (who puts an autoclave there?), and even if they did, autoclaves are not randomly portable that way. Seriously.

Kate brings her own blood to the analyst? Why would you let someone who’s potentially infected have the chance to swap out fluids for a negative test result?

“Remind me to never investigate a plague again” is the best line ever, hehe.

May I point out that not everyone on the team may want to be working in BSL-4? Like Ethan??

If the team’s been keeping the news of the deaths and outbreak quiet, how would Youtube know to send it to them specifically?

I wonder if they quarantined or otherwise screened the relatives of the deceased? Also, “will you please explain to him how the internet works?” is also a great line. Delivered just right.

How can Curtis tell Ethan to just relax? Ethan should keep calm, yes, but he should go fix his suit, shouldn’t he?

I am confused why the FBI guy doesn’t even ask for an ETA on the lab results to confirm meningitis before telling her “no we’re not confirming it before telling the public what we think it is.”

Is Kate taking off her gloves without exiting BSL-4? I can’t tell. But I do like the way she’s not telling anyone, trying to squeeze out the blood, looking for blood in her innermost glove, etc, because those are all fairly typical reactions.

I find the interrogation scene with the teenager somewhat unlikely, but his sarcasm is at least on the mark, and the reactions within it sensible and entertaining. And thank you for pointing out why it can’t possibly be airborne, because Megan never explained it to anyone and it didn’t make sense for her to just expect that the non-medical people would get it and believe her without an explanation.

How does being through decontamination guarantee that you won’t catch it afterwards? *raises eyebrow*

I sort of think that the eyes are much more evidently jaundiced than bloodshot. Also why wouldn’t patient zero be dead by now, given that the subsequent cases have all died? Either that or he’s probably recovered. What is the mortality rate on this, anyway?

Why isn’t Kate in on that meeting, anyway? And… the terrorist isn’t still out there, because he’s presumably either dead or recovered and no longer infectious, I would think?

Episode break!

Is the CDC guy not a doctor, and he’s just a researcher? There’s no way.

That sort of makes sense, the way they say it: first some internal bleeding, then more internal bleeding that shows some of the other symptoms they observed (like the purpura that they didn’t re-mention), hypotensive shock, and cerebral/pulmonary edema before death. But why did they make Kate look so shocked as she looks around the isolation ward?

Really? The FBI guy’s going to be the first one to figure out that the terrorist might be dead already?

Go Peter! Also, making progress with syringes, good. And yay Kate for noticing Trevino, because I, at least, find it hard to keep track of the number of days that have passed in a TV show.

It seems sooo unlikely for the terrorist to have somehow figured out a way to stay alive longer without some kind of trial-and-error testing, and for that you’d have seen deaths beforehand. But it is sort of awesome that Trevino is a “walking pharmacy” (on 17 different drugs for various reasons).

Really, are they going to go to a shot of an empty bed (presumably Trevino’s) during the terrorist call just because the ME’s office happened to call right then and name Trevino as their suspect? He’s in isolation! I get that the bar is near the hospital, but how do you expect him to have gotten out, seriously?

Why are they pointing at the two “electron microscope” images as if they indicate that the two samples are clearly from different people? And why do they then point at the images as they mention the interferon and how the one sample’s supposed to have more of it that clusters more or whatever?

Marburg is not the “bastard cousin” of Ebola. (I mean, calling it a “bastard” makes it sound like it’s engineered, doesn’t it?) Nor is it nastier, if I recall correctly. Also there are more than 3 filoviruses. Also also the mortality rate for Marburg is not as high as they’re making it seem with their “they all died!” statements every now and then. Also also also the symptoms don’t seem as bad as I thought they ought to be for Marburg. They’re definitely not as bad as the symptoms for Ebola, though at least Stafford (the CDC guy) said the words “unmentionable orifices” a little earlier.

That is sooo not adequate consent. True consent means that the subject actually understands the risks involved, and given how quickly Trevino is given the vaccine (behind Megan’s back during the few moments she takes to talk to Kate), it seems incredibly unlikely that he understands the risks.

Stafford’s explanation of why he picks Trevino is totally unreasonable: even if the biology made sense, the math wouldn’t. First of all, vaccines don’t “target virus particles” or anything. But even if they did, his argument that a higher viral load would make it “easier” for the vaccines to “target” the virus particles is only saying that more virus particles would be reached, but the percentage would presumably be similar and there would be more virus particles left at the end, still. And it’s a vaccine, which is preventative, so the earlier you get it, the more chance it has of working. Why does this not make it into anything?

Why is Peter not wearing gloves? I understand that the file is supposed to be clean, but I wouldn’t trust that, with Marburg on the loose….

Ah, closing shot of the terrorist watching the school, setting up for “he’s going to target the kids next! Oh no!” But I wonder what he’s really going to target, because an older, sick man would sort of stand out in an elementary school, and it’s not like kids all play on the same playground toy or anything.

Yay bed bugs. And haha, Megan looks all indignant as Johnson (the head FBI guy) brings Peter along to the hotel but not Megan.

Guys, if you shoot him his blood will aerosolize. (I was wondering, earlier, why Bud was carrying a shotgun when they stormed that abandoned warehouse.)

And now, because they’ve been trying to make us believe that Marburg has a nearly 100% mortality rate, they can’t just let Kate be one of the three out of four survivors (that’s what I recall Marburg’s mortality rate being, anyway). And I guess they’re going to play off the rest of the survivors as “they didn’t actually have Marburg”?

Yay for the inevitable happy ending, though Dani’s death at the beginning was quite a shock. I feel like usually TV shows put the shocking death in the middle or at the end of the episode instead of at the beginning, and I’m not sure whether putting it at the beginning is better (because that’s where you least expect it) or not as good (because you have the rest of the episode to distract you while your subconscious processes most of it for you).