Disease X can cause the next deadliest pandemic. In 2020, COVID-19 pandemic caused unprecedented loss of lives and resulted in collapse of healthcare infrastructure in the whole world. SARS-CoV-2 (agent responsible for COVID-19 pandemic) was a virus that transferred to human from animals and had mutations that led to a devastating pandemic. With rapid climate change and increasing interaction with animals, a threat of such pandemic is looming in air that can hit the world anytime.
To prepare for such pandemic in future, WHO is preparing itself and to emphasize, they have called the next such disease as “Disease X”. Basically, Disease X is not disease yet but it can break out in future just like COVID-19. Keep reading as we unfold everything about it.
What is Disease X?
Disease X is not a disease that exist currently. It is hypothetical disease that can hit the world in future. Scientists have the opinion that some unknown pathogen can cause a pandemic 20 times deadliest pandemic than COVID-19 in the future. We don’t know about that disease yet. We don’t know about disease causing virus/agent yet. But keeping in view the scenario of COVID-19, it can happen again. As disease and disease-causing agent are unknown that’s why it is called “Disease X”.
A threat of unknown future deadly disease was included in the WHO Blueprint list in 2018. WHO and governments are preparing and investing in R & D against diseases listed on WHO Blueprint on priority basis. As the saying “Prevention is better than cure”. Hence the WHO is preparing itself to timely respond to a future pandemic that can happen.
To our amaze, COVID-19 pandemic was also a disease X that emerged suddenly and no one had immunity against it. World was not prepared to tackle such a huge pandemic either. SARS-CoV-2 has killed millions worldwide. However, vaccines could save millions of lives as emergency response.
Disease X Symptoms:
As we already stated, Disease X doesn’t exist currently. It is a hypothetical disease. Therefore, currently, we don’t have any knowledge that what are its features and symptoms. What are its transmission patterns and everything related to it. No one can predict its symptoms for now. However, fever is always a natural response of body to an infection. An unusual fever lasting many days can be a sign of serious illness and must not be ignored.
Casgevy: New CRISPR-Cas9 based Therapy for Sickle Cell Disease and β-Thalassemia
Disease X Pandemic: Why are we preparing for it?
Disease X is a hidden but inevitable creeping danger. No one knows or can predict and how, when and where the disease X will emerge. However, it is evident that a future pandemic like COVID-19 can occur anytime that can be result of spilling some zoonotic virus from animal into humans. If we take a brief look of history, many new diseases and infections has occurred only in 21st century. Naming a few; MERS, Zika, SARS-CoV-1, and many others. As we can see, pathogen outbreaks that can cause deadly diseases and fatalities in people are increasing. Therefore, there is a greater chance of a new infectious disease than ever have been.
Disease X Next Pandemic:
According to WHO, Disease X could cause next pandemic and it can be 20 times more deadly than COVID-19 pandemic. Therefore, world is taking preemptive measures to tackle it timely. But here arises a question.
How to prepare for Disease X if it doesn’t exist yet?
This question is logical and makes sense. And the answer to this question lies in recent history of infections and pathogens that caused them.
In the history of 21st century, so far, there are 25 families of viruses that have caused severe illnesses in humans so far. They mostly transferred in humans from animals. Therefore, scientists have the opinion that new Disease X can also emerge from any of these families of viruses. And if we are able to study them in more details, it will prepare us to timely response any outbreak/pandemic in future. It is also noticeable that novel diseases emerge in all parts of the world all the time. Most spill from animals into humans.
Knowledge is power. Although humans can’t predict for now that when a Disease X will emerge and what would be its features, they can still know much more about pathogens that can cause them. Filling knowledge gap about these viruses can speed up the preemptive measures that humans can take at time of emergency. Better understanding of viral morphology, structure, anatomy, proteins, outer coats, spike proteins, their DNA or RNA, and transmission patterns can help in preparing drugs or vaccines.
Disease X Vaccine:
As Disease X doesn’t exist so the vaccine for it. However, better knowledge about 25 disease causing families of viruses can help in vaccine design and preparation in future. CEPI (The Coalition for Epidemic Preparedness Innovations) 100 Days Mission plan is to develop new vaccines against novel or known infectious diseases within three months of their pandemic threat being recognized.
10 Best Botanical Terpenes to Try in 2024
Conclusion
Pandemic and outbreaks have been an inevitable part of human history. Most recently, COVID-19 has wrecked the havoc on the world. But it was not the first, neither will it be last. Therefore, we need to be prepared for the next pandemic/outbreak as soon as possible.
