IN ONE GENERATION: A Fantasy

ALARM

It happened in one generation.

In 2033 public health agencies all over the world began reporting births of children with a peculiar gross malformation of the lower limbs. By 2035 these births numbered in the thousands worldwide, and were clearly on the increase. Two startling facts emerged.

First, the malformation was always bilateral and essentially uniform: The hip joint was normal but the thighbone very short. The knee joint was angled such that the lower limb would bend perpendicular to the axis of the body rather than in alignment. The tibia and fibula were no longer than the thighbone. The heel was vestigial and the ankle was in form and function more like a wrist. The toes were longer than average but within what had been thought of as normal limits. The great toe was quite recognizable and bore the only toenail. A web of skin covered the other toes but imaging revealed the familiar bone structure of the human forefoot.

Overall the organs gave the appearance of flippers. At rest they lay curved across the lower abdomen, the end of one laid upon the other. In waking hours they were as active as the rest of the infant's body. Neurological testing demonstrated appropriate reflex reaction and motor control of what appeared to be serviceable musculature. In every other respect these infants were as healthy as any comparable population. The media quickly dubbed the phenomenon the "flipper syndrome." It was not a syndrome, though, since no other defect or anomaly appeared to be associated with it. They had lower limbs unserviceable for walking; otherwise these infants showed a normal spectrum of wellness. Most were very well babies indeed.

The second fact to emerge was that all the mothers of these babies were in their early teens and their first pregnancy. In the developed world the majority had been aborted either because of the mother's age or because the defect was picked up in ultrasound. As thousands of these babies began appearing in poorer regions, however, alarm verging on panic enveloped governments. The World Health Organization and the rest of the public health establishment worldwide soon found themselves under enormous pressure to identify a cause and find a cure.

In June 2035 the NIH identified a mutant gene as the agent. There was no immediate explanation, however, as to what would cause the identical mutation to appear simultaneously in thousands upon thousands of births all over the world. A pattern did emerge. Women born before 2020 continued to bear children with normally developed legs while the children of those born after almost always suffered the mutation. The timing led to speculation about a connection with the appearance of genetically modified grain into the human food supply, but no scientifically admissible cause and effect relationship had been proven.

Parents, physicians and ethicists agonized over a course of action. Some orthopedic surgeons advocated immediate amputation at the end of the foreshortened thigh and early fitting of prostheses. Others asserted the logistical difficulty of fitting adequate prostheses for so many thousands, whose number was increasing daily, and expressed doubt as to how many children with such high bilateral amputations could master walking with them. Even if all or most of the affected children could be fitted, how could the poorer countries where most of them lived afford to replace the prostheses as they wore out or were outgrown? These declared that one way or the other most if not all of these children would wind up using wheelchairs if not walking on their hands, so why hasten surgical intervention? Meanwhile, pregnancies just about ceased everywhere in the world and a universal despair began to take hold.

At 7:00 p.m. on December 15, 2035, the media announced that President Hugh McDonough would address the nation from the White House an hour later. The subject would be the genetics crisis, as it had come to be called. Almost three years into his second term, the 60-year-old McDonough had managed a balance of economic prosperity and social benefits which gained him the respect of both major political parties. His wife Sarah Jenkins McDonough was considered the most intelligent and tasteful First Lady since Jackie Kennedy. Two of their daughters had been married in the White House and it seemed the entire nation had become the fan club of them and their four brothers.

None had won the heart of the country more than Rory, the youngest of the presidential family. Rory McDonough was born with spina bifida. He had been a full time wheelchair user from the time he was eight, when he gave up his struggle with crutches and braces. At ten he left his native Wisaquasa Falls with his family to move into the governor's mansion. They still lived there when Rory graduated high school in 2028, the year his father was elected President.

Thoroughly wholesome and outgoing, the family had lived in the media spotlight since Hugh McDonough's surprise election as Governor. Many were of the opinion that Rory in particular should have had more privacy in his growing up but in truth Rory did not mind the spotlight a bit, any more than his parents did. The disabled community considered that this self-possessed boy's way with words, his knowing smile and his dry humor had done more to get their needs met than all the campaigns of previous decades, and as he grew into adolescence he only got better. Rory McDonough was a consummately relatable kid who happened to need a wheelchair to get around as he grew into young manhood in the public eye.

At 8:00 p.m. television cameras in the East Room of the White House focused the eyes of most of the world on the President and First Lady seated on one side of a round table. Between them in his wheelchair sat Rory, now in his second year at Harvard Law School. In straight chairs on a low platform behind them sat the two daughters who had been married in the White House, Laura with her husband Michael Kennedy and their daughter Shelby and son Brian, four and two respectively; and Julie with her husband Edwin Stanford. With them in the first row was the President's oldest son Hugh III with his wife Sharon and Sarah their six-year-old. In a second row, a little higher, sat the President's two unmarried sons Ryan and Timothy, as well as his younger brother Michael with his wife Mary McCay McDonough, in from California with their sons Michael, Jr. and Joseph, who at 15 and 11 were dead ringers for their cousin Rory when he was their age.

The resemblance of the two brothers to their famous cousin had brought them all quite an adventure nearly three years before. HBO convinced the three of them and their parents to let them make a movie about Rory's growing up. It was vastly popular and had launched Joseph into a career as a child star. Rory had his offers also as did Michael but both regarded their stint in the entertainment spotlight as a one-time experience, not a career move.