Yzabelle Bostyn
SCIENTISTS have identified the cause of the next global pandemic.
After the Covid-19 shook the world, scientists are determined to be prepared for the next pandemic.
Following the combined results of 187 scientific studies, all the evidence points to one perpetrator, the flu virus.
Although details of the study have not yet been released, The Guardian has revealed that 57% of illness experts believe the flu will be the culprit of the next pandemic.
The full details will be revealed next week at the European Society of Clinical Microbiology and Infectious Diseases (ESCMID) conference in Barcelona.
It comes after the World Health Organisation (WHO) warned the H5N1 variant of bird flu is a ‘enormous worry’.
Currently, there is no evidence that the virus can be spread between humans.
However, when humans have caught the disease, it has a very high mortality rate.
Flu is always a substantial worry in the scientific community, as it often mutates to pass more easily between people.
The study was carried out by Spanish scientist, Jon Salmanton-Garcia, from the University of Cologne (Germany).
Speaking to the Guardian, he explained flu breakouts which happen every winter can be described as ‘small pandemics’.
Although the different strains are not ‘viral enough’ to be considered pandemics, he claimed ‘it may not always be this way’.
The future pandemic is currently known as ‘Illness X’ and over 20% of scientists see it as a real possibility.
On the other hand, 15% of scientists interviewed still believe that Sars-CoV-2, also known as Covid-19, is still a threat to humanity.
Last Friday, April 19, the boss of the global flu prevention programme, Zhang Wenqing, said since 2020 the rates of flu have ‘grown exponentially’, especially in birds and mammals.
She especially highlighted the growing cases registered in livestock in farms in the United States.
According to the University of Glasgow virologist, Ed Hutchinson: ‘The risks of this virus are increasing more and more for farm animals and from farm animals to humans, they are much greater.
“The more the virus spreads, the more chances are that it will mutate to spread amongst humans.”
Speaking to the Guardian, he assured that if a virus like the Covid-19 pandemic were to break out, we would be ‘much more prepared’ as with Covid-19, we had to develop a vaccine ‘from nothing.’
