why does the author skip ahead three months

There is a time lag in the action. The chapter “Three Months Later” foreshadows the events to come in the woods. Just after Tamaya runs into the woods after Chad, the novel skips ahead three months to tell the reader “In February of the following year, three months after Tamaya went back into the woods to search for Chad, the Senate Committee on Energy and the Environment held a new set of hearings. These hearings were not secret. By this time, the entire world knew about SunRay Farm, Biolene, and the disaster that had occurred in Heath Cliff, Pennsylvania” (99). The chapter goes on to inform the reader that thousands of people were infected by the ergonyms and one person died in the woods. Immediately, the reader begins to hypothesize that either Chad or Tamaya must have been the casualty in the woods.