Chapter 2577 - Investigation (Part 4)
Treatment for female pseudohermaphroditism typically combined drugs with surgery. The children were still too young for surgical intervention, so for now the standard approach was cortisone-type drugs to suppress excessive pituitary adrenocorticotropic hormone secretion, preventing further masculinization and premature epiphyseal closure.
"The corrective treatment requires cortisone-type drugs, which are currently Level 1 controlled substances—only available through Bairen General Hospital's pharmacy," Zheng Mingjiang said. "Let's write a report to admit all the affected children and transfer them there. I'll be honest: pediatrics and endocrinology aren't my strong suits. We should have Dr. Ai and Dr. Shi consult."
"We're of the same mind," Lin and Fu agreed. "Remediation is still possible at this stage. This affects people's entire lives—we can't afford delays."
Zheng Mingjiang suddenly remembered something. "Did they catch the person selling the fake medicine?"
"Not yet, but we know who she is—a midwife," Lin Motian said. "Police have staked out her home. They'll arrest her the moment she returns."
Over the past two or three years, Guangzhou's police agencies had cracked multiple cases of traveling doctors swindling people under the name of "Australian miracle drugs," so they had considerable experience handling this case. Through questioning the victims' families, they quickly determined the true identity of the woman selling "Australian fetus-changing medicine"—a local midwife. After the Joint Midwifery Clinic opened and required midwives to work with certification, she had failed to get certified and had been secretly delivering babies in the countryside ever since. She'd leveraged her long-established connections from years of midwifery work to peddle her "miracle drug."
By the time police came looking, the midwife had already vanished. But through interviews, they learned she had likely gone to Huizhou to restock, so the case was transferred to the joint investigation team for further handling.
"Huizhou again! How strange." Zheng Mingjiang was puzzled. "Could Huizhou have become the birthplace of Australian miracle drugs?" But thinking further, the Luofu Mountain medicine market was renowned as one of the four great markets under heaven—all kinds of medicines were distributed there. "Miracle drugs" concocted with "Australian drugs" were probably no exception.
A premonition crept over Zheng Mingjiang: the Senate's drug leakage problems probably weren't the one or two holes they'd originally thought, but rather a sieve.
Back in her office, Zheng Mingjiang hurried to read the report Fu Qiliang had given her. She noticed it mentioned that all the affected children's families reported the expectant mothers had used "fetus-changing medicine" during pregnancy.
According to their accounts, the "fetus-changing medicine" was medicinal wine in a porcelain bottle, claiming that rubbing it on a pregnant woman's belly would "change yin to yang."
This mysterious medicinal wine obviously contained testosterone. That was what had caused nearly twenty infants' genital malformations.
"How ignorant and reckless!" Zheng Mingjiang sighed. But she was helpless—never mind the 17th century; in the old timeline, people had similarly sold male hormones to pregnant women as fetus-changing drugs, causing fetal malformations.
Concepts that decades of the People's Republic couldn't change—the Senate couldn't hope to change either. The only solution was to cut off the source.
Fortunately, this wasn't urgently needed medication. As long as production controlled raw materials and sales strictly enforced prescription rights, it could largely be contained. The advantage of limited usage and few applications was easy quantity verification at every stage. Compared to antibiotics, it was far more manageable.
So where was it leaking from? Zheng Mingjiang was puzzled. According to the documents, the "fetus-changing medicine" appeared as "medicinal wine," which indicated the forger had substantial pharmacological knowledge of testosterone drugs. Taking male hormones orally carried considerable risk, potentially causing kidney failure and other side effects, so injection or external application was typically used instead. The trial drugs she'd seen sent to the pharmacy were all gel preparations, also marked "oral consumption prohibited."
The counterfeiter was probably quite familiar with Australian drug usage and contraindications—that's why they'd repackaged the gel as medicinal wine, to avoid deadly lawsuits.
All things considered, leakage through pharmaceutical factory channels seemed unlikely. Zheng Mingjiang knew the general level of current pharmaceutical factory workers. They only knew how to produce according to process procedures—they were completely ignorant about drug properties and pharmacology. At most they knew what a drug was for, but usage methods and contraindications were largely beyond them.
This meant whoever was leaking drugs to manufacture counterfeits was likely a medical or pharmaceutical worker.
Suddenly she thought of the "fetus-changing pills" she'd purchased in Foshan—those weren't medicinal wine. What if they contained testosterone? A cold sweat broke over her. If a pregnant woman actually swallowed those, wouldn't it kill both mother and child?
At this thought, she hurriedly retrieved a box of "Fetus-Changing Pills" from her cabinet of samples, crushed them, and after some preparation examined them under the microscope.
After a long while, she breathed a slight sigh of relief: these pills contained no purified chemical crystalline substances—only fragments of various traditional Chinese medicines. Though she couldn't be completely certain, they most likely didn't contain testosterone.
So the fetus-changing pills sold everywhere on the streets and the fetus-changing medicinal wine weren't the same thing at all? Zheng Mingjiang's head began to ache. She'd originally assumed there must be some connection between the two, but now it seemed one was fake medicine and the other was a knockoff of fake medicine. Apart from both claiming "fetus-changing" miraculous effects, they probably had nothing to do with each other.
Never mind—better go to Huizhou first to investigate. Compared to this inexplicable fetus-changing medicine, the antibiotic problem was obviously more pressing.
But how to proceed once in Huizhou? The situation there was far more complicated than Danzhou. Danzhou was merely a "prefecture," but Huizhou was "Huizhou Prefecture" with ten subordinate counties. Located on the critical East River route, it was the "key town of Eastern Guangdong," long serving as the political, economic, military, and cultural center of the East River basin and a major commodity distribution hub. In ancient times it was called "Famous Prefecture of Lingnan" and "Gateway to Eastern Guangdong." It was also a Hakka stronghold, one of the "Four Hakka Prefectures." Here lived not only Hakka but also large numbers of Cantonese and Chaoshan people, plus Yao people in the mountains. The complexity of the situation far exceeded anything Guangzhou or Foshan presented.
Though Huizhou had been designated a priority governance zone due to its strategic position, this priority governance was probably far inferior to Foshan and Guangzhou. If Zheng Mingjiang brought a few investigation team members there, people would likely know as soon as they entered the prefectural city.
For an ordinary case, going to Huizhou wouldn't be so sensitive. But the drug leakage case obviously involved naturalized citizens whose understanding of the Senate far exceeded that of ordinary people. The moment she appeared in Huizhou, various demons and monsters would probably go into hiding...
Yet not going to Huizhou and entrusting some naturalized citizen—she simply couldn't set her mind at ease. After much deliberation, she went to see Wu Mu for his opinion.
"Personally, I don't think you should go to Huizhou—it would cause too much commotion." Wu Mu was characteristically blunt. "When an Elder moves, security arrangements are required; the locality has to arrange reception. If the other side is paying attention, before you've even left Guangzhou, Huizhou will have gotten word. Once the enemy hears an Elder from the health sector is coming—no matter what pretext you use—as long as they're not idiots, they can guess."
"That's exactly what I was thinking." Zheng Mingjiang nodded. "But if I don't go, I'm uneasy. This drug-related work is quite specialized..."
"We've been in this timeline for almost ten years now, haven't we? Some things should be left to naturalized citizens. Are we going to handle everything ourselves forever?" Wu Mu said. "My suggestion is to select one or two naturalized citizen cadres you trust who understand the specialty. The three-person team I originally assigned you stays as is. Just use the Cheka's name—they already have a flying inspection system. Suddenly landing in Huizhou to check ledgers wouldn't attract attention."
"Good idea. Let me think about it." In an instant, Zheng Mingjiang ran through several names of local health sector cadres. The health sector differed from other departments—because of the specialized nature and personal safety implications, almost all workers had been trained in Lingao. Even if Zheng Mingjiang didn't know them personally, their faces were familiar.
"But this person should preferably have some distance from health sector people, otherwise they'd be easily recognized." Wu Mu added. "Moreover, he should ideally be Cantonese—whether Chaoshan, Hakka, or Cantonese—so going to the Huizhou medicine market for undercover investigation wouldn't attract attention."
After much thought, a suitable candidate suddenly came to mind—and this person was already in Huizhou.
"I have someone. Though he's in the health sector, he's currently stationed in Huizhou, directing all of the prefecture's medical work. Since he's already there, just giving him a document can let him join the investigation team's work without drawing attention."
This person was actually one of her students—young and talented. She'd originally planned to invest considerable effort cultivating him at Bairen General Hospital. Unfortunately, current social conditions meant male obstetrician-gynecologists were difficult for people to accept, and demand for neurologists was also quite limited. After much consideration, she could only send him on external assignment to Guangdong for practical experience, training him as a general practitioner.
"One person isn't enough. Can you add another?"
Zheng Mingjiang thought it over and came up with a second candidate. In terms of qualifications, he met all of Wu Mu's requirements, but he was too old, carried himself with a pedantic scholar's manner, and was basically an outsider professionally. Oh well—when choosing among limited options, she'd take what she could get.
"Old Yuan!" A young man with a satchel rode a bicycle, wobbling along the newly-laid cinder road, and braked sharply in front of a middle-aged man approaching elderly.
This man wore a half-new, half-old indigo "cadre uniform," with a fountain pen—symbol of status and culture—tucked in his breast pocket. He held a roll of documents, gesticulating and shouting loudly about something. It was none other than Yuan Shuzhi, who had passed as number one in the Municipal Comprehensive Governance Bureau sanitation specialist examination back then.
(End of Chapter)