Europe must be prepared for the ‘high risk’ of a flu pandemic, a World Health Organization (WHO) chief sensationally claimed today.
Dr Maria Van Kerkhove, the UN agency’s acting director for pandemic preparedness, said it was a ‘certainty’ the continent would face the threat of influenza.
Speaking on a WHO podcast, she argued Covid would not be ‘the last pandemic we will deal with in our lifetimes’.
Instead, an unknown future threat could strike in unprecedented fashion.
But the respected epidemiologist also admitted coronavirus ‘did not have to be as bad as it was’.
Dr Maria Van Kerkhove, the UN agency’s acting director for pandemic preparedness, said it was a ‘certainty’ the continent would face the threat of influenza. Speaking on a WHO podcast, she argued Covid would not be ‘the last pandemic we will deal with in our lifetimes’
In 2018, the WHO identified nine priority diseases (listed) that pose the biggest risk to public health. They were deemed to be most risky due to a lack of treatments or their ability to cause a pandemic. This included disease X — a placeholder name for an unknown future threat
Sir John Bell (pictured), who served as Boris Johnson ‘s testing tsar during Covid, said it was ‘inconceivable’ the country wouldn’t face a further ‘big event’. Addressing MPs sitting on the Health and Social Care Committee, he argued there was a ’20 or 30 per cent chance’ another pandemic would occur within 20 years
She told Health in Europe: ‘For me, flu is a certainty because it’s so much in circulation. It’s infected many different species.
‘We have avian influenza and the opportunities for reassortance [genetic changes to a virus that allow it to jump between species], the opportunities for a pandemic of influenza virus are high.
‘That’s why we have a whole system in place to be prepared for this. The challenge is, will we see another coronavirus pandemic?
‘Given that we had SARS-CoV-2 cause a pandemic, for sure, this is an opportunity. The question is, will we see an Arbovirus pandemic?’
Arboviruses, also known as arthropod-borne viruses, refer to infections spread to people by the bite of infected insects such as mosquitoes and ticks.
She added: ‘Now, I’m not saying this to scare people who are listening to this, but for us, it’s something that we have to be prepared for.
‘So, we have to think out of the box. Really prepare for what are the known threats, but also think out of the box for something different, perhaps waterborne or whatnot.
‘So for me, pandemics, unfortunately, are part of what we will deal with in our lifetimes.
‘I don’t believe this will be the last pandemic we will deal with in our lifetimes.’
For decades, leading scientists have warned bird flu is the most likely contender for triggering the next pandemic.
Experts say this is because of the threat of recombination, when two viruses merge to create a hybrid.
High natural levels of human flu raise the risk of someone having both at the same time, which can spawn such a situation.
Others have long speculated disease X — representing a hypothetical, currently unknown pathogen — would more generally come from zoonotic transmission, an animal virus or bacteria that jumps to humans.
Some have even warned that this could be sparked by a biological mutation, or an accident or terror attack, that catches the world by surprise and spreads fast.
The now-defunct Public Health England also warned in 2019 that the growing threat of superbugs could help a once harmless bacteria into becoming disease X.
Covid itself is originally thought to have come from an animal, most likely a bat.
However, an ever-growing number of experts suspect that experiments conducted in Wuhan may have sparked its spread among people.
Pressed later during the podcast if WHO was prepared for the next pandemic, Dr Van Kerkhove admitted that while it had ‘strong systems in place’, the ‘world’s trust in science’ has taken a hit.
She added: ‘There have to be commitments in place to ensure that we do better the next time.
‘Covid did not have to be as bad as it was, as it is and we owe it to our children, our grandchildren to make sure that we, we keep up these systems and have that commitment in place to make sure that we do better the next time.’
It comes as Sir Jeremy Farrar, an influential member of SAGE — No10’s advisory panel, told the Covid Inquiry last year that another pandemic is ‘inevitable’.
Giving evidence remotely he said: ‘It’s clear we’re living in a pandemic age, which is going to have more frequent and more complex pandemics.
‘And yet it is extraordinarily difficult when governments are faced with dealing with the challenges of day to day, to also put in place those critical infrastructures, resilience and surge capacity and spare capacity, that would allow us to deal with the unexpected, but inevitable disruptions that are going to occur.’
Sir Jeremy who now works for the World Health Organization as its chief scientist, quit SAGE during the pandemic after condemning the country’s laissez-faire response.
He told the probe: ‘I think in the UK and around the world, despite the warnings of the last 20 years, there has been a complacency about the need to prepare for these sorts of major disruptive events which go well beyond health to the whole of society.
‘And the UK, yes, was complacent in regards to planning for that.’
Meanwhile in March, Sir John Bell — who served as Boris Johnson‘s testing tsar during Covid — said Brits must ‘get used’ to the fact another pandemic is ‘definitely going to happen’.
Addressing MPs sitting on the Health and Social Care Committee, he argued there was a ’20 or 30 per cent chance’ another pandemic would occur within 20 years.
Sir John, a regius professor of medicine at Oxford University, also admitted Covid itself could have been ‘much worse’.
He said if the Omicron variant, which didn’t emerge until November 2021, had been the initial strain, the ‘whole system would have collapsed’.
