Pomona College Magazine Spring/Summer 2019: Medical
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COLLEGE MAGAZINE BACK TO THE HOT ZONE A thwarted movie project reborn on TV ANATOMY OF AN OUTBREAK CDC’s Matt Wise ’01 tracks a deadly bug THE FACE OF A PANDEMIC Why was the Spanish flu of 1918 so lethal? Spring/Summer 2019 MEDICAL MYSTERIES [HOMEPAGE] From left: Eric Garcia ’19 and Professor Chuck Taylor Illustration by Steve Stankiewicz 1 From left: Cynthia Nyongesa ’19 and Professor Richard Lewis 2 Illustration by Steve Stankiewicz Spring/Summer 2019 3 From left: Professor Alexandra Papoutsaki and Caroline Chou (CMC ’19) 4 Illustration by Steve Stankiewicz Spring/Summer 2019 5 [STRAY THOUGHTS] [ MEDICAL MYSTERIES ] COLLEGE MAGAZINE DEPARTMENTS A Mystery with a Name Home Page 1 About a dozen years ago, on an ordinary workday morning, as I was following my ordinary Pomona Stray Thoughts 6 workday routine, something inexplicable happened. My wife, a teacher, had already left for SPRING/SUMMER 2019 • VOLUME 55, NO. 2 school. After dressing, I felt a bit odd, so instead of going straight to work, I sat down for a Letter Box 8 moment and opened my laptop. And discovered that I no longer knew how to open a file. My mind had become a hopeless jumble. I couldn’t recall the names of the people I EDITOR/DESIGNER Pomoniana 9 worked with, couldn’t formulate a clear thought or even hold a murky one in my head for Mark Wood ([email protected]) Milestones 12 more than a few seconds at a time. Out of all that confusion, one terrible conviction BOOK EDITOR emerged. This must be what it feels like to have a stroke. Sneha Abraham ([email protected]) Book Talk 14 It never occurred to me to dial 911. All I could think of was phoning my wife, but I CONTRIBUTORS couldn’t remember the name of the school where she worked. I pawed through our file Kate Becker (“The Face of a Pandemic”) is a writer based in How To 18 cabinet, searching through drawers for old pay stubs. Finding a number for the school’s Brookline, Mass. She studied physics and astronomy and served as a senior editorial researcher for the NOVA sci- Team Work 20 front office, I left what must have been a strange and alarming message for my wife. ence documentary series. She writes about “everything I don’t remember how long it took her to come to my rescue under the sun, and over it, too.” Artifact 22 or what I did in the meantime or what she said to me when she Max Blau (“Anatomy of an Outbreak”) is an Atlanta-based New Knowledge 23 arrived. All of my recollections from that day are sketchy and dis- freelance journalist focused on narrative and investigative jointed. I remember the emergency room and the neurologist stories. His stories have appeared in Atlanta Magazine, The Picture This 24 questioning me. I vaguely remember various tests and scans. I Boston Globe, CNN, The New York Times and Politico. recall becoming fixated on the initials “TIA,” which stand for CONTRIBUTING STAFF Bulletin Board 50 “transient ischemic attack”—a kind of mini-stroke that my father Lupe Castaneda Robyn Norwood had suffered on a couple of occasions—telling my wife about Carla Guerrero ’06 Jeremy Snyder ’19 Class Notes 52 them over and over, each time the first for my muddled brain. Jeff Hing Kristopher Vargas Mark Kendall Patty Vest Obituaries 58 And I remember the comic relief of the day—the man in the next bed, who looked and sounded like a character right out of Submissions and Changes: Last Look 64 For class notes, address changes, photos and birth or death The Godfather, asking me what was wrong. I said I was having notices, email: [email protected]; phone: (909) 607-8129; trouble remembering things, to which he replied with a wise-guy or fax: 909-621-8535. For other editorial matters or grin, “Well, do you remember the $200 you owe me?” submissions, phone: 909-621-8158, email [email protected] ON THE COVER or mail to Pomona College Magazine, 550 N. College Ave., Eventually, the neurologist returned with a diagnosis and a smile. I hadn’t had a stroke. Claremont, CA 91711. Magazine policies are available at: Actors Liam Cunningham and Julianna All my results were normal. The diagnosis: a rare and poorly understood condition with no www.pomona.edu/magazine/guidelines. Margulies star in the National Geographic known cause, called “transient global amnesia.” (I thought at the time—and still think— scripted miniseries The Hot Zone, the culmination of a 25-year-long collaboration betweeen author that “transient global amnesia” sounds like something invented for a soap opera plot. Pomona College Magazine is published three times a year. Copyright 2019 by Pomona Richard Preston ’76 and producer Lynda Obst “Now we know why Bryan disappeared. He was suffering from transient global amnesia.”) College, 550 North College Ave., Claremont, CA 91711. ’72, to air May 27. (Photo courtesy of National The good news, the doctor said, was that I would almost certainly be back to my usual Geographic/Amanda Matlovich) self within a day and never have a relapse. And he was right. By lunchtime, I felt better, and Pomona College by the time I left the emergency room, mid-afternoon, I was back to normal. And I’ve is an independent liberal arts college located in Claremont, Calif. Established in 1887, it is the stayed that way, more or less—so far, anyway. founding member of The Claremont Colleges. But I doubt that I’ll ever again have quite the same confidence in my own “normal” FEATURES PRESIDENT cognitive functioning. Since that day, whenever I feel a bit odd or have trouble remember- G. Gabrielle Starr ing a word or a name, I go through a careful litany of friends’ and family members’ names and phone numbers in my mind, just to reassure myself that it’s not happening again. Nondiscrimination Policy Back to the Hot Zone It would be comforting to believe that everything that can go wrong with us has both a Pomona College complies with all applicable state and 26 magazine.pomona.edu label and a clear explanation, but what I learned that day—something every doctor knows, federal civil rights laws prohibiting discrimination in The 1995 blockbuster movie that never happened is reborn as a TV miniseries, education and the workplace. This policy of non- bringing the “Odyssey” of Richard Preston ’76 and Lynda Obst ’72 full circle. I suppose—is that a disorder can have a name and still be a mystery. discrimination covers admission, access and service in Medical mysteries abound, and not just in the headlines about emerging diseases like Pomona College programs and activities, as well as hiring, This issue of Pomona College promotion, compensation, benefits and all other terms Ebola. As you’ll read in Kate Becker’s “The Face of a Pandemic,” a century after the Span- and conditions of employment at Pomona College. Magazine is dedicated to ish flu swept away something like 5 percent of the total world population, we’re still trying 36 Anatomy of an Outbreak Perdita Sheirich to figure out why it was so lethal. And almost everyone knows someone suffering from Tracking a deadly food-borne outbreak with CDC disease detective Matt Wise ’01 longtime PCM class notes editor, some chronic illness that seems to defy diagnosis and effective treatment. who recently retired from that role As I learned later, my own diagnosis that day was made purely by process of elimination. after carrying it out with great care It wasn’t a stroke or a tumor or anything else the doctors could pinpoint, so it must be and dedication, issue after issue, transient global amnesia—a mystery with a name, but no less a mystery for that. 42 The Face of a Pandemic Like millions of other young adults, Adolfo Sartini shouldn’t have died from the 1918 Spanish flu. for approximately half a century— —MW FPO or about 150 issues. But he did. And in retirement, molecular biologist Ruth Craig ’74 is still seeking answers. 6 Spring/Summer 2019 Pomona College Magazine 7 [LETTER BOX] [POMONIANA] mosphere system. Your quotes from Dr. Lancaster only so that you could enclose the letter asking Revelle and Gore that say, “You had what was an insidious exam- for monetary support? Not acceptable. It would ple of what I would call a lack of ethics in sci- be far better to communicate with the target au- I read with some dismay your editorial introduc- ence and the use of scientists as hired guns by dience by email, and to make an online-only ARCHIVING ing the article about Roger Revelle. While I am the industry” would seem to conflict with his edition of PCM an option to reduce paper glad you appreciate the immense impact statement, dated April 29,1994, which resulted use/waste as well. HISTORIC that Roger had in his scientific career, you have from his losing Dr. Singer’s defamation suit. But seriously: no more plastic! perpetuated a myth that Roger was “somehow There he says, “I fully and unequivocally retract —Mary Stanton-Anderson ’75 COSTUMES persuaded to lend his name to an article he re- and disclaim those statements and their implica- University Place, WA portedly had no hand in authoring.” This myth tions about the conduct, character and ethics of TUCKED AWAY INSIDE the costume was created and propagated by Al Gore, who Professor Singer…” It was Gore who tried to shop of Pomona’s Seaver Theatre is a Dear PCM Reader was upset that Roger, whom he had heard lec- use Roger as a “hired gun,” not Fred Singer.