Re: Poisons and disease

by **Parker Gabriel** » Fri Nov 02, 2007 1:12 am

In Leo Eaton's "The Place Of The Angels," Captain Scarlet's retro-metabolism was described as rendering him immune to diseases like the artificial one that the Judy Chapman likeness stole and tried to use, on behalf of the Mysterons, to infect the water supply of Los Angeles. But that does not mean he would not be a carrier. least of all a healthy carrier like "Typhoid Mary" Mallon was.

by **Marion** » Fri Nov 02, 2007 8:06 am

I always thought it was a bit mean of them to put Blue in quarantine with Scarlet - the chances were that they might cross-infect each other and for Blue that'd have been fatal - permanently.
It can't have been an easy time for either of them - both watching the other wondering if they were about to die from this bacteria.
Maybe Dr Fawn's clinical compassion isn't a million miles away from Dr Gold's in NCS after all? :wink:

by **Parker Gabriel** » Tue Aug 05, 2008 8:32 pm

I suppose that with everyone's nerves on edge because of what the Mysterons were doing, Dr. Fawn got rattled enough to slip up in regard to quarantine protocols.

by **Intensity Angel** » Fri Jun 12, 2009 12:33 pm

Dr Fawn wouldn't be very good at his job if he couldn't do his job under pressure.

I like the idea of him being a carrier. It raises the question can a virus mutate to match his DNA structure and hide from his immune system.

by **gojohnniegogo** » Fri Jun 12, 2009 3:01 pm

Intensity Angel wrote:Dr Fawn wouldn't be very good at his job if he couldn't do his job under pressure.

I like the idea of him being a carrier. It raises the question can a virus mutate to match his DNA structure and hide from his immune system.

Would be interesting Fan Fic that's for sure. I'd have liked to have seen a NCS Episode tackle that issue.

by **Parker Gabriel** » Fri Jun 12, 2009 5:35 pm

Intensity Angel wrote:"Dr Fawn wouldn't be very good at his job if he couldn't do his job under pressure."

This was most likely much greater pressure than he had ever had to handle previously, and even the best physicians can commit potentially life-threatening mistakes at such times.

by **Marion** » Fri Jun 12, 2009 5:41 pm

I can see that Fawn would be under pressure with regard to the mortality of the rest of the captains, but once Scarlet's proved to be 'almost indestructible' it must be some relief to Fawn to know that Scarlet's someone he doesn't have to worry about all the time.
I am sure that Fawn's fascinated and exasperated by retrometabolism and his failure to crack how it works, in equal measure.

by **Parker Gabriel** » Fri Jun 12, 2009 6:06 pm

I say again: more pressure than ever before.

And yea, some of that pressure on Dr. Fawn does come from how much about the retro-metabolic process he still does not understand.

by **Shades** » Sat Jun 13, 2009 7:51 am

Agreed. He could never be sure about what the limits are exactly. Even if Scarlet survived, it could have left him affected in other ways, depending on exactly what the bacteria attacks and how. Like how polio survivors are often left with crippled limbs.

Considering the quarantine, I think considering the restricted space, electrical load and weight and equipment issues it's reasonable to suggest that Cloudbase has only one quarantine room with all the equipment necessary to isolate patients and enable staff to come and go safely without risking the rest of the base.

by **Marion** » Sat Jun 13, 2009 1:32 pm

I thought the whole idea of quarantine was to keep somebody with potentially dangerous infections away from other people so they didn't catch it?
I get the impression from the scene that neither Scarlet nor Blue are exactly comfortable with the situation - okay, who would be when you might have a deadly infection - but they are not even isolated from each other within their shared room.
The colonel says something like: we can assume Scarlet will be immune to the virus, but everything must be done for Captain Blue. And yet Fawn still puts them in together! If Scarlet's infected and Blue isn't - he soon will be and given that you would assess each patient's risk of dying individually, that doesn't strike me as a good idea.
I am sure Fawn and White do worry about Scarlet's capacity to continue to survive, and don't like to make him suffer any more than necessary, but they shouldn't - and surely wouldn't - do that to the detriment of the other serving officers. So, I still say: 10 out of 10 for worrying about Scarlet, but 0/10 for worrying about the far more at risk Captain Blue.

[I presume it was just cheaper and easier for the programme makers to create one quarantine room set, and I accept and discount that, as we're talking what would happen in 'reality' and not for a TV show here

]

by **gojohnniegogo** » Tue Jun 16, 2009 6:23 pm

They probably wouldn't have needed two though, they would only need the one as both characters wouldn't appear at the same time, perhaps to create an effect they could have just mirrored the room (providing there are no visual texts to give it away - shall have to check that again) to give the impression it is a different one. May have thought a little too much about that one :shock:

by **Doc Denim** » Tue Jun 16, 2009 10:15 pm

Just thinking aloud here - and it's been a while since I've actually watched the episode - but I seem to recall that both Scarlet and Blue were present when the broken vial was discovered - so in terms of exposure to the virus, they'd have both been at risk simultaneously. Also - I'm not sure how fast the emergency forces arrived to deal with isolating the two of them, what facilities they used to do that and then how the two were then transported to Cloudbase for further observation. To minimize risk to assisting personnel, keeping the both of them together probably made sense 'on scene'.

I would also speculate that in the event Scarlet had been exposed, he would likely have become ill along with Blue - probably even dying from the virus, and then recovering after the fact courtesy of his retrometabolism - through the (OCS) series we often saw Scarlet dying of violently sustained injuries, but I can't remember ever seeing him 'ill' and therefore we don't really have any history of how he reacts to non-acute but otherwise life-threatening happenstances. (We can't even say he was saved from the champagne by his retrometabolism in that particular case, because he never had any - but Colonel White seemed to have an expectation that he'd have been as incapacitated as his comrades had he managed to get any down at the time.)

Again, I have to wonder what the 'thresholds' and 'mechanisms' of Scarlet's retrometabolism might be and just how far a situation has to go before it kicks in to 'save' him - before or after an expected 'human-normal' demise...

food for thought...

Doc Denim

by **Intensity Angel** » Thu Jun 18, 2009 11:21 am

How adavanced is his immune system on that point anyway?

Sharks have a really advanced immune system. They can fall ill but not for very long and it has to be something really powerful to knock them (I'm speaking metaphorically).

Speaking of thresholds, maybe like with sharks, there is a point at which an illness like a virus can overwhelm him and knock him about a little: I can't imagine Scarlet falling ill with the common cold anytime soon.

by **RhapsodyAngel8** » Thu Jun 18, 2009 3:04 pm

Certainly, NCS Scarlet appears to be susceptible to disease – although we don't see him actually die, he does suffer quite nastily :twisted:

from the virulent Razar’s disease in ‘Touch of the Reaper’, with a significant recovery time spent in quarantine afterwards. I agree with Doc Denim and would imagine that OCS Scarlet would suffer in a similar way.

Doc Denim wrote:Again, I have to wonder what the 'thresholds' and 'mechanisms' of Scarlet's retrometabolism might be and just how far a situation has to go before it kicks in to 'save' him - before or after an expected 'human-normal' demise...

It is possible that his retrometabolism may only kick in after a certain time and wouldn’t act prophylactically, as a ‘protective barrier’ (for want of a better description). If a disease / poison acts very rapidly, then the chances are that he would suffer initially – possibly even dying - before recovering. The more rapid and severe the disease, the more he would be likely to suffer.

by **Shades** » Thu Jun 18, 2009 8:02 pm

I wonder... if his system is invaded by a virus or bacterium, would his body fight it in the normal way- T-cells, antibodies, white blood cells etc, or if it was one serious enough to kill him, would his system die, then revive him once the virus/bacteria has gone inert/died.

If it is the former, would it be plausible to take a sample of his blood and then extract from that the anitbodies and white blood cells?