The White Plague [Volume: 7(1988), pp. 431-504]

THE WHITE PLAGUE
463
SECOND REPORTER
And what makes you think they'll listen to you?
GALEN
They've got to. The thing is... If they don't, they'll die of the Cheng
Syndrome. I discovered the treatment; it's mine. And I won't let it out
of my hands until... until they promise to stop killing one another.
You'll tell them, won't you? You see, I... Nobody else knows the formula.
Ask anyone here at the clinic. I'm the only one who can cure it. They're
all past the cut-off age, all those heads of state. Tell them they'll rot alive...
like the people you saw in there. Tell them nobody's exempt.. Absolutely
nobody.
THIRD REPORTER
Would you let them die?
GALEN
Would you let them go on murdering? When people go around pumping
lead and gas into one another, why should doctors save them? If you
knew what it takes to save a child's life or even set a fracture... But no,
they want war! How can I, a doctor, condone their bombs and chemicals? I've seen what it does to a man. I don't know about politicians, but
speaking as a doctor, as a doctor, gentlemen, I am obliged to fight for every
human life. Every doctor must do everything in his power to put an end
to war.
THIRD REPORTER
And how do you intend to go about it?
GALEN
How? Simple. Once every nation in the world agrees to renounce military
might, I will hand over the cure.
(The DEPUTY ASSISTANT runs out.)
THIRD REPORTER
Can you be more specific? How do you envision imposing your will on
individual governments?
GALEN
That's the hard part. I know the governments won't negoticate with me.
Buf if you put it in the papers, if you make it known that no country
will receive the cure until it renounces war, then...
THIRD REPORTER
But what about self-defence?