B4 Metro The Boston Globe THURSDAY, SEPTEMBER 19, 2019
the intrusion. Many people de-
faulted to the assumption that
the men seeking power belong
in it, because how scary is it if
that power structure shifts?
What then?
A Supreme Court appoint-
ment could be dashed over a
mere accusation! We fretted
over this for a couple of weeks
until he was confirmed.
Now, Kavanaugh is back in
the news because a new book
by New York Times reporters
revealed the FBI never chased
down the individuals who
might have corroborated claims
of his bad behavior. The FBI
was in a rush, after all, and
hadn’t he already been vetted?
Wouldn’t we have heard some-
thing before now if there was
something to hear?
The latest stories show it
hasn’t gotten any easier for usuWHAT SHE SAID
Continued from Page B1to confront these challenges to
power. The willingness to put
one’s head in the sand and ac-
cept the word of an entitled
man to protect a brand is just as
instinctive today as it was four
years ago. Individuals and insti-
tutions are still willing to turn a
blind eye if they’re winning.
MIT was happy to accept
millions from Epstein, a con-
victed pedophile, as long as no
one found out about it. (News
flash: We did.) The New Eng-
land Patriots benefited from
Brown’s dazzling performance
on Sunday, dodging pesky ques-
tions about a woman’s claims
that he had sexually assaulted
her three times. (Addressing it
would have been awkward,
what with team owner Robert
Kraft still mired in his own sex
scandal in Florida.) So, carry
on, ladies. Nothing to see here.
That is not to say that any
one of these men is guilty (ex-cept Epstein, who was convict-
ed and whose crimes continue
to unspool in garish detail). It’s
wrong and counterproductive
to convict any man on our
worst assumptions. But haven’t
we learned yet how corrosive
and diminishing it is to reflex-
ively ignore women’s voices, to
assume the worst of them?
The US Senate last year did
not have to declare Kavanaugh
guiltytoconductafullinvesti-
gation before declaring him in-
nocent. The Patriots do not
need to declare Brown a rapist
before saying they won’t toler-
ate it if he is, and declaring the
actions and language ascribed
to him as abhorrent.
MITdidnotneed toownthe
crimes of Jeffrey Epstein; he
was the sexual predator. It
merely needed to admit that it
took Epstein’s money while
hoping that no one would no-
tice. Instead, it covered up thedetails, which dribbled out.
The New York Times bob-
bled the handling of the latest
book’s revelations about Ka-
vanaugh, giving President
Trump and other critics an
opening to delegitimize them.
That’s unfortunate, because it
landed at the same time as an-
other book by New York Times
reporters who broke the story
about Weinstein, and that pro-
vides a master class tutorial on
news gathering, objectivity, and
doggedness.
Like all the women who told
the #MeToo stories they
prompted, Jodi Kantor and Me-
gan Twohey put themselves on
the line to tell a truth the world
might learn from.
How disappointing that it
hasn’t.“What She Said” is an
occasional column on gender
issues.Worldstillnotlisteningtowomen’svoices
Why aren’t there any
vaccines?
There are. Several, in fact. A
vaccine is available for horses,
and several other vaccines are
in development. But none has
been approved for use in hu-
mans.
“The technology exists,” said
Dan H. Barouch, director of the
Center for Virology and Vaccine
Research at Beth Israel Deacon-
ess Medical Center. “It just
hasn’t been made yet.”Why not?
There’s no market for it be-
cause the virus is extremely
rare.
“It’s not as much a scientific
challenge as a financial chal-
lenge,” said Scott C. Weaver, sci-
entific director of the Galveston
National Laboratory at the Uni-
versity of Texas Medical
Branch.
Weaver’s laboratory has test-
ed a couple of promising vac-
cines in mice.
He was working with fund-
ing from the Department of De-
fense, but midway through, the
agency changed course and
funded research into a different
virus. No pharmaceutical com-
pany has been interested in
picking up the bill, because so
few people would want the vac-
cine. “Typically, to bring a vac-
cine to licensure and market
costs hundreds of millions of
dollars,” Weaver said.
William B. Klimstra, a mem-
ber of the Center for Vaccine
Research at the University of
Pittsburgh, has two different
vaccines in development, one
funded by the National Insti-
tutes of Health and one by the
Department of Defense. His
team has tested them in mice
and expects to start testing non-
human primates.Why can’t people
take the horse
vaccine?
The Army developed a hu-
man EEE vaccine similar to the
horse vaccine, but it’s offered
only to people who work in lab-
oratories where they might be
exposed.
It’s not an especially effec-uEEE
Continued from Page B1tive vaccine, in people or hors-
es. At least two doses are re-
quired, and the immunity
doesn’t last long. The vaccine
has been approved for clinical
trials in humans, Weaver said,
so if a pharmaceutical company
were interested, it could get
started quickly.
Testing a vaccine against a
rare illness is difficult, however.
The usual way is to vaccinate
one group of people, inject a
placebo in a comparable group,
and see whether the vaccinated
group stays healthy.
But because EEE is so rare,
such a study wouldn’t provide
meaningful results. Instead, re-
searchers would have to dem-
onstrate that the vaccine is ef-
fective in nonhuman primates
by deliberately exposing them
to the virus.Why is the Pentagon
interested in EEE?
Because the virus is a poten-
tial bio-weapon. EEE can be
aerosolized and sprayed on
troops. Inhaling the virus
through the nose would give it
direct access to the brain. It’s
known that animals can be in-
fected this way, and there have
been a few scattered cases of
people infected in the laborato-
ry from inhaling the virus,
Weaver said.
At first blush, EEE might not
seem like a good candidate for a
weapon, considering that many
people bitten by EEE-infected
mosquitoes don’t get sick. Dur-
ing a 1959 EEE outbreak in
New Jersey, Weaver said, a
study of blood samples foundthat for every person who fell ill
with EEE, 20 other people had
been infected but experienced
no symptoms. But he said there
have been few similar studies to
replicate this.
In any case, it’s likely that an
aerosolized virus would be
much more deadly. Spraying
the virus would deliver a larger
dose than a mosquito bite, and
animal studies suggest sickness
is more severe with aerosolized
EEE.Why does EEE cause
severe illness?
EEE is dangerous because it
bypasses the immune system’s
first line of defense, the sentinel
cells that alert the body that it
has been infected, Klimstra
said. The virus goes straight to
the brain without hindrance or
warning.
So people don’t get typical
viral symptoms like headache,
malaise, and fever. Instead, the
first signs are neurologic: stiff
neck, severe headache, fatigue.
“You don’t know you’re in-
fected until the infection is very
severe,” Klimstra said.
And there is no medication
that attacks the virus and no
specific treatment.Why do EEE
infections happen
only in some years?
It’s not well understood.
Massachusetts experienced
EEE outbreaks in 2004-2006
and 2010-2012, with a few cas-
es in between. The mosquitoes
that carry EEE don’t typically
bite people. But in some years,
the virus is found in human-bit-
ing mosquitoes. It’s not clear
what drives this change or why
it happens every few years.Where does that
leave us?
With the usual advice to do
what you can to prevent mos-
quito bites, such as by avoiding
outdoor activities from dusk to
dawn and using insect repel-
lent. “It’s very rare,” said Tonya
Colpitts, a Boston University
microbiologist, “but it only
takes one bite.”Felice J. Freyer can be reached
at [email protected].Despitethreat,EEEshotisunlikely
By David Abel
GLOBE STAFF
The North Atlantic right
whale found dead this week off
Long Island, N.Y., has been
identified as a 40-plus-year-old
male who had been seen this
summer entangled in fishing
gear in Canadian waters.
The whale, known to re-
searchers as “Snake Eyes,” was
last seen entangled in the Gulf
of St. Lawrence in August, after
being seen there free of gear in
July.
“This is his first sighting
since the entanglement,” said
Jennifer Goebel, a spokeswom-
an for the National Oceanic and
Atmospheric Administration.
Scientists at the New Eng-
land Aquarium called the whale
Snake Eyes because of two
bright white scars on the front
of his head “that look like a pair
of eyes when he swam towards
you,” they said Wednesday.
Given his age and his pro-
pensitytobeinknownmating
areas for right whales, the sci-
entists said, “One would expect
him to be one of the great fa-
thers of the population.”
“The loss of Snake Eyes is a
tragedy, but a tragedy made
that more grievous knowing”
that he’s the ninth right whale
to die this year, said Philip
Hamilton, a senior right whale
scientist at the aquarium.
The whale had been towed
Tuesday to Jones Beach State
Park on Long Island, where re-
searchers from the Internation-
al Fund for Animal Welfare and
the Center for Coastal Studies,
organizations based in Massa-
chusetts, performed a necropsy
on Wednesday.
The researchers did not dis-close the cause of death, though
the entanglement is suspected.
Entanglement has been the
leading cause of death in recent
years for right whales, whose
population is believed to have
declined to fewer than 400, a
drop of more than 20 percent
over the past decade.
A study by scientists at the
animal welfare group found
that, when a cause of death
could be determined, 64 per-
cent of right whales died as a re-
sult of entanglements in fishing
gear since 2010. The rest died
as a result of being hit by ships.
Scientists say that only about
half of dead whales are found.
The danger of entangle-
ments led a team organized by
NOAA this year to recommend
that the agency require lobster-
men to reduce as much as half
of their buoy lines in the Gulf of
Maine. The lines rise from traps
on the seafloor to buoys at the
surface.That proposal sparked a
backlash among lobstermen
and their representatives. This
summer, Maine’s governor and
the entire congressional delega-
tion sent a letter to President
Trump, urging him to direct
NOAA to delay or reject the pro-
posed regulations. Moreover,
the Maine Lobstermen’s Associ-ation, which has a seat on the
teamthatcameupwiththe
proposed regulations and ini-
tially supported them, an-
nounced recently that it was
withdrawing support.
With few right whales found
dead in Maine waters, the asso-
ciation has argued that the pro-
posed regulations would be un-fairly onerous for the lobster in-
dustry, which generates about a
half-billiondollarsayearfor
the state’s economy.
On Wednesday, more than a
dozen right whale scientists
from the region sent a letter to
the congressional delegation of
Maine, urging support for the
proposed regulations.
They noted that the 3 mil-
lion buoy lines from Maine lob-
stermen account for nearly 90
percent of all fishing lines in the
Gulf of Maine, and that right
whales are known to inhabit
the state’s coastal waters.
The nine right whales found
dead this year represent the
second highest number of
known deaths in one year. In
2017, a record 17 right whales
were found dead. Last year,
there were no calves born.David Abel can be reached at
[email protected]. Follow him
on Twitter @davabel.Right whale found dead this week known to scientists
Male reportedly
last seen tangled
in fishing gear
SUZANNE KREITER/GLOBE STAFF
In Atkinson, N.H., Art
Scarpa’s daughter’s
miniature horses have all
been vaccinated for EEE.DON EMMERT/AFP/GETTY IMAGES/FILE
The North Atlantic right whale known as “Snake Eyes,”
shown here in the Bay of Fundy, was found dead this week.
†Guaranteed not to clog for as long as you own your home, or we will clean your gutters for free.
* Does not include cost of material. Expires 9/30/19.
**All participants who attend an estimated 60-90-minute in-home product consultation will receive a $100 gift certificate. Visit https://www.restaurant.com/about/terms for complete terms and
conditions and https://www.restaurant.comfor participating restaurants. Retail value is $100. Offer sponsored by LeafGuard Holdings Inc. Limitone per household. Company procures, sells,
and installs seamless gutter protection. This offer is valid for homeowners over 18 years of age. If married or involved with a life partner, both cohabitating persons must attend and complete
presentation together. Participants must have a photo ID, be able to understand English, and be legally able to enter into a contract. The following persons are not eligible for this offer: employees
of Company or affiliated companies or entities, their immediate family members, previous participants in a Company in-home consultation within the past 12 months and all current and former
Company customers. Gift may not be extended, transferred, or substituted except that Company may substitute a gift of equal or greater value if it deems it necessary. Gift card will be mailed to
the participant via first class United States Mail within 21 days of receipt of the promotion form. Not valid in conjunction with any other promotion or discount of any kind. Offer is subject to change
without notice prior to reservation. Expires 9/30/19.
***All participants who attend an estimated 60-90-minute in-home product consultation and choose to make a purchase will receive a $200 Visa gift card. Retail value is $200.00. Offer sponsored
by LeafGuard Holdings Inc. Limit one per household. Company procures, sells, and installs seamless gutter protection.This offer is valid for homeowners over 18 years of age.The following persons
are not eligible for this offer: employees of Company or affiliated companies or entities, their immediate family members, previous participants in aCompany in-home consultation within the past
12 months and all current and former Company customers. Gift may not be extended, transferred, or substituted except that Company may substitute a gift of equal or greater value if it deems it
necessary. Gift card will be mailed to the participant via first class United States Mail within 10 days of receipt of the promotion form. Not valid in conjunction with any other promotion or discount
of any kind. Offer is subject to change without notice prior to reservation. Expires 9/30/19.
LeafGuard operates as LeafGuard of New England in Massachusetts under MA HIC registration number 191456 and in Rhode Island under RI Contractor Reg. # 42097**75% Off Labor***
Receivea$ 100
Restaurant.com
GiftCard with
FREEin-homeestimate!**
Receivea$ 20 0VISAGiftCardwithyour
**LeafGuard purchase!*****
**
babsonarts.org
JAMIE KENT
AND FRIENDS
ARTS
Thursday, September 26, 7:00 P.M.
Carling-Sorenson Theater
Wellesley, MA
Free Admission with Reservation
at babsonARTS.org or 781-239-5880.