A Deadly Illness Begins in Kenya
In 1980, a Frenchman named Charles Monet was living near Mount Elgon in western Kenya. He liked the natural world more than crowded human company, and he spent much of his free time outdoors. Around New Year’s, he visited Kitum Cave, a huge volcanic cave where elephants, bats, and other animals moved through a dark, dry space thick with dung and dust.
Soon after returning, Monet became sick. It started with a headache and fever, then quickly turned into something much worse. He began vomiting, his eyes turned red, and his behavior changed as the illness spread through his body and started to affect his mind.
What was happening inside him was brutal. The virus had entered his cells and turned them into factories that made more virus. As the infection spread, it damaged blood vessels and organs at the same time, causing clotting in some places and bleeding in others, a pattern that led to total collapse.
Monet flew to Nairobi, hoping to reach better medical care. By the time he arrived at the hospital, he was barely holding on. In the emergency room, his body failed in a catastrophic way, and the virus, now present in large amounts in his fluids, was suddenly in direct contact with the people trying to save him.
One of those people was Dr. Shem Musoke. During the desperate attempt to treat Monet, Musoke was splashed in the face with vomit and blood. Days later, he developed the same fever, pain, and red eyes, and doctors realized they were dealing with something far more dangerous than an ordinary tropical disease.
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