Sunil Cariappa

Sunil Nadikerianda Cariappa (born June 2nd 2001) is an Indo-Canadian public health physician, data scientist, and climate epidemiologist who is credited with the discovery of Cariappa-Muren disease (CMD) along with Connie Muren.

Born in Dharwad, Cariappa’s family moved to Toronto in 2004. He obtained a degree in Epidemiology from the University of Ottawa in 2026 and started working as a research analyst for the Public Health Agency of Canada (PHAC) in 2028.

In 2038, Cariappa first identified piscine transmissible amyloidotic encephalopathy (PTAE) after his cat became infected, which led to the discovery of CMD in 2039. He played a pivotal role in the international response to the CMD pandemic and the later description of CMD phobia.

Cariappa’s experience with the CMD pandemic and the response to it, which he summarised in a widely quoted report, led to his cooperation with Zhupao on the development of G6. In 2040, Cariappa distanced himself from the project, believing that it had drifted too far from its original design goals.

After disappearing from the public eye, Cariappa founded Nuance in 2045. He currently serves as the company’s CTO, though he has announced his intention to retire in 2051.

On October 6th 2049, Cariappa was reported missing during a visit to India, with his whereabouts unaccounted for since September 30th 2049.

Early life and educationPermalink

Sunil Cariappa was born on June 2nd 2001 in Dharwad, India. He is the third child in a family of two sons and two daughters born to Nadikerianda Poovayya Cariappa, a consultant for the Canada-India Business Council (C-IBC), and Vijayamma Jayashree. Cariappa’s family moved to Toronto, Canada when he was three years old.

In 2019, Cariappa was accepted to McGill University on an entrance scholarship and completed his undergraduate degree as a Doctor of Medicine. In 2026, he graduated as a Master of Science in Epidemiology at the University of Ottawa.

CareerPermalink

From 2026 to 2027, Cariappa served as a representative on the Committee on Health Policy and Economics of the Canadian Medical Association (CMA). In March 2028, Cariappa began to work as a research analyst for the Public Health Agency of Canada (PHAC), where he contributed significantly to the field of climate epidemiology.

In 2033, Cariappa became acting Head of Knowledge Development and Research for the PHAC and held the temporary position for eight months, after which it was made official. In this capacity, Cariappa led two working groups, supervised three research analysts, issued correspondence on matters related to community-associated infections, and chaired the planning committee for a symposium on waterborne diseases in Quebec City.

Discovery of CMDPermalink

Index casePermalink

In October 2038, Cariappa’s cat, a 14-year-old Maltese named Captain Thunderpaw, began developing symptoms ranging from unusual aggression and excessive drooling to gait abnormalities and convulsions. A veterinarian diagnosed Captain Thunderpaw with ataxia, possibly due to an underlying neurological condition, but in spite of the prescribed medications, he died two weeks later. ^[1]

When looking into Captain Thunderpaw’s illness, Cariappa made use of the Global Public Health Intelligence Network (GPHIN) to look for any mention of similar cases. He found an upward trend in reports and descriptions of domestic cats exhibiting unusual behaviour followed by progressive immobility and death, which were variously diagnosed as Addison’s disease, epilepsy, hypoglycemia, and different types of ataxia.

Cariappa suspected an outbreak of food poisoning and coordinated a preliminary investigation, including a series of necropsies on recently deceased cats in Canada and the United States (US). Over half of the necropsies revealed the presence of amyloids in the nervous tissue, a hallmark symptom of feline spongiform encephalopathy (FSE). Cariappa determined that all FSE-positive samples belonged to deceased cats that had been fed Lassgard tuna, which he believed to be contaminated with a novel prion agent.

Shared discoveryPermalink

Fearing that the prion agent was spreading to people as well, Cariappa searched for any reports of atypical variant Creutzfeldt-Jakob disease (vCJD), eventually finding an article co-authored by Connie Muren and Gerhard Kobl-Thissen on the medical case of Deng Yixing. ^[2] Cariappa reached out to Muren in November 2038 and suggested a link between the cat mortalities and Muren’s diagnosis of Deng.

Cariappa and Muren began to communicate over video calls so they could confirm their find before raising any alarm. While Muren had samples of Lassgard tuna delivered to the University of Düsseldorf for analysis, Cariappa worked out epidemiological models based on distribution figures of Lassgard tuna and established research into previous bovine spongiform encephalopathy (BSE) epidemics.

By January 2039, Muren had determined that a significant proportion of brain samples gathered from Lassgard tuna showed advanced amyloidosis. Although there was some debate regarding its origin, Cariappa and Muren jointly described this amyloidosis as piscine transmissible amyloidotic encephalopathy (PTAE) and reported it to the Global Foodborne Infections Network (GFN).

WHO responsePermalink

Largely due to a disinformation campaign from Lassgard Bioteknik, the GFN limited its response by exploiting PTAE’s foodborne origin to convene an Outbreak Control Team (OCT) instead of starting an official investigation, which Cariappa described as “tantamount to inaction.” While Muren ran a study to confirm PTAE’s transmission potential to humans, Cariappa conducted surveys through GPHIN, which uncovered a number of additional cases with pathologies similar to that of Deng.

By July 2039, Muren had demonstrated that transgenic mice infected with brain material from Lassgard tuna could develop a clinical disease similar to vCJD. Cariappa and Muren prepared a report on the disease, which they described as acquired prionopathic neurodegeneration syndrome (APNS), and submitted it to the World Health Organisation (WHO). ^[3] This resulted in the declaration of a Public Health Emergency of International Concern (PHEIC), which significantly expanded the OCT’s scope.

In October 2039, the OCT was given access to a leaked data cache of internal Lassgard Bioteknik correspondence. After reviewing the files, Muren was able to conclusively determine that Lassgard tuna was contaminated with BSE-infected fish meal, which had been continuously used as a feed stock since the tuna’s first aquaculture cycle was started in 2031. Cariappa estimated that the outbreak of CMD would result in approximately three million cases worldwide.

On October 23rd 2039, World News Wire (WNW) began running a series of investigative articles that exposed Lassgard Bioteknik’s malpractice based on the data leak and the OCT’s work. When the WHO classified Cariappa-Muren disease (CMD) as a pandemic and issued a global alert on October 25th 2039, Cariappa experienced a sudden increase in media attention.

Description of CMD phobiaPermalink

In December 2039, Muren asked Cariappa to assume her liaison duties with the WHO’s Emergency Committee. Cariappa proceeded to coordinate with the Global Outbreak Alert and Response Network (GOARN) to distribute information packets and medical colloids to physicians and hospitals in countries with reported cases of CMD. The information packets included instructions for logging all positive diagnoses with GOARN, allowing the OCT to gather more precise epidemiological data.

When Cariappa found a discrepancy in this data, he linked it to a related GPHIN search which suggested that people were excessively and unduly worried about being infected with CMD, experiencing psychosomatic symptoms, and seeking medical assistance. This pervasive anxiety was contaminating records of doctor’s visits and hospital admissions with false positives, leading Cariappa to describe a somatic symptom disorder (SSD) specific to CMD.

After writing a report about the CMD-specific SSD, which would later become known as CMD phobia, Cariappa issued a recommendation for updated communication guidelines to the WHO’s Emergency Committee. The new guidelines advised health communicators to emphasise the low likelihood of contracting CMD and avoid the use of severe-sounding and loaded terms such as pandemic, infection, or spread.

In January 2040, Cariappa’s updated guidelines were rescinded by then-WHO Director-General Yang Jinglei, who believed that “softening the language surrounding CMD at a time when people need to be acutely aware of the disease’s long-term implications is premature and irresponsible.” Yang removed Cariappa from the OCT on January 27th 2040, telling him that he had lost the public credibility necessary to reflect the actions of the WHO.

Chinese investigationPermalink

On March 11th 2040, Cariappa was contacted by Yang, who was engaged in negotiations with the Chinese Communist Party (CCP) to allow international authorities to assess the CMD pandemic in China. Muren had been part of the negotiations prior to her disappearance, but the CCP had withdrawn her invitation after her criticism of mìngyùn had gone viral in February 2040. Yang informed Cariappa that the CCP was prepared to extend him an invitation in Muren’s stead, which he accepted.

On March 21st 2040, Cariappa and Yang travelled to Beijing and met with officials from the National Health Commission (NHC). After sitting in on a conference organised by the CCP’s Politburo, Cariappa was assigned an office in the NHC building. He was immediately struck by the strict limitations imposed on whom he could speak to and what data he was allowed to review, an experience he later likened to “being held hostage.”

When Cariappa found out that the OCT was working with information that was incompatible with what he was sending out, he learned that his reports were being intercepted and altered by the Ministry of Public Security (MPS). Cariappa also noticed that his activities in China were being misrepresented by CCP officials, who framed his and Yang’s presence in China as part of the CCP’s development of mìngyùn and the distribution of implantable medical devices (IMDs) designed by Huawei.

On March 30th 2040, Xu Shaoyong publicly vouched for Cariappa, stating that both the WHO and the CCP should “take [Cariappa’s] words more seriously instead of always hiding or twisting them.” Xu invited Cariappa to Zhupao’s headquarters in Shanghai, where he took part in a press event on April 3rd 2040 during which Xu accused the CCP of covering up its failings in addressing the CMD pandemic. ^[4] On April 12th 2040, the CCP authorised the NHC to cooperate fully with Cariappa and the WHO, which allowed the OCT to complete a range of spatial epidemiology studies.

The WHO declared the CMD pandemic contained after the OCT issued its official report to the NHC on April 19th 2040. The report included a widely quoted appendix with Cariappa’s personal observations on the WHO’s and the CCP’s handling of the pandemic. He concluded that the CCP’s initial censorship of CMD and refusal to cooperate with the WHO had created an information vacuum that promoted rumours and speculation, serving as a catalyst for the spread of CMD phobia. ^[5]

Contribution to G6Permalink

First designPermalink

On May 1st 2040, Cariappa travelled to London City at Xu’s request and met with Spencer Hagen, who explained that Zhupao was in the final negotiating stages of a partnership with the CCP to overhaul China’s healthcare system. At the same time, the CCP was drafting a new cooperation strategy with the WHO to “strengthen the national healthcare system, ensure that quality health services are delivered to the people, and enrich China’s contribution to global health and biosurveillance.” ^[6]

Hagen proposed to combine both missions with Cariappa at the centre, suggesting that he was uniquely qualified to spearhead the data science and interoperability aspects of a biosurveillance network that would meet the concerns listed in his appendix. After reaching an agreement with the PHAC to officially represent Canada’s contribution to the cooperation strategy, Cariappa relocated to London City and joined the G6 design team.

On May 7th 2040, Zhupao organised a conference to unveil G6 as “a new WHO-endorsed standard for biosurveillance, health informatics, and IMDs,” with Xu naming Cariappa, Hagen, and Efua Amankwah-Crouse as the team leads of the project. ^[7] Cariappa participated in the conference via livestream and spoke about his vision for G6, explaining that “it would not be a top-down solution that can be dropped onto every crisis of public health. If G6 is to be a system that can be deployed in every situation, we will ensure that it is designed to capture and respect the nuances of each.” ^[8]

On May 10th 2040, the NHC provided the G6 design team with restricted login credentials to mìngyùn as part of a CCP mandate to emulate its software and artificial intelligence (AI) components. In September 2040, Cariappa joined Amankwah-Crouse, Hagen, and Xu to introduce G6 to an audience of officials from the CCP and the WHO, leading to a series of pilot programmes to test G6 in the Chinese provinces of Guangdong, Sichuan, Yunnan, and Zhejiang. Cariappa was invited to supervise the tests, but he felt uncomfortable with travelling to China and decided to coordinate with the PHAC for a G6 pilot programme in Canada.

Project walkoutPermalink

On September 19th 2040, Cariappa was contacted by Amankwah-Crouse, whose life-cycle assessment (LCA) study of the pilot programmes had indicated that G6’s differentiable neural computers (DNCs) were being trained on undisclosed data sets.

Cariappa and Amankwah-Crouse found that the G6 DNCs were being used to process close to 85 quintillion (10¹⁸) databases, all originating from worldwide public and private sources. The filenames showed references to data formats attributed to social media and data platforms, surveillance systems and companies, and financial institutions. Cariappa believed the CCP to be responsible and suggested they inform Xu, but Amankwah-Crouse was reluctant to contact him.

On September 28th 2040, Cariappa terminated his contract with Zhupao, stating that G6 “works as intended, but it is not being used as intended.” Contrary to popular belief, Cariappa was not involved with G6 being adopted outside of China, and has claimed no knowledge of the quantum neural network (QNN) retrofits engineered by Cengal following his departure.

Cariappa made no public appearances or communications between 2041 and 2044, giving rise to various rumours and conspiracy theories, including that he remained a silent partner on G6, that CMD was deliberately engineered by him, and that he orchestrated Muren’s disappearance. In 2043, Cariappa moved to Düsseldorf after the CCP announced that London City would be established as a Chinese special economic zone (SEZ) by 2045.

NuancePermalink

In May 2044, Cariappa founded Nuance as “a counterweight to Omnius,” accusing the company of “doing no more than taking ownership of localised data extraction systems, integrating them into G6, and then licensing them back to Zhupao’s clients.” ^[9]

After an initial slate of Nuance partnerships and projects in Canada, India, South Africa, and the US, Cariappa asked Amankwah-Crouse to join Nuance as a consultant. She accepted in August 2045, though she was forced to step down in October 2045 after being accused of having instigated a leak of sensitive information related to G6. Cariappa defended Amankwah-Crouse from accusations that she was Adira and echoed assertions that Adira is a false flag operation orchestrated by Zhupao.

In 2046, Cariappa transitioned to the role of Nuance’s CTO and announced Zac Paris as the company’s newly appointed CEO. In 2049, Cariappa indicated his intention to retire from public life on June 2nd 2051, his 50th birthday.

DisappearancePermalink

On October 6th 2049, Cariappa was reported missing in Mumbai. According to a statement from Paris, Cariappa was visiting India because “he’d never been back there since his family moved to Canada.” ^[10] A police investigation has been started, which revealed that Cariappa’s neurometric ping stopped in a local hotel after 22:30 IST on September 30th 2049, indicating the use of a collocidal, possibly as part of an abduction. Amankwah-Crouse has been cited in the investigation, as she had travelled to Düsseldorf for a meeting with Cariappa a week before his disappearance.

Personal lifePermalink

Cariappa met his partner Chris McLaren through an online dating app in 2026. They married in 2028 and separated in 2043 when Cariappa moved to Düsseldorf.

Cariappa was diagnosed with a mild form of autism spectrum (AS) in 2006 after he struggled with basic social interactions in school. His parents were initially reluctant to recognise this diagnosis, but later came around and helped him with practicing routines and building familiarity.

See alsoPermalink

• Cariappa-Muren disease
• Connie Muren
• G6
• Nuance

ReferencesPermalink