Antiquity

We are nearing mid of December 2022, however still the Covid-19 pandemic is far from over as we are seeing a new spike in cases in China as I write this article. In parallel, a new threat of monkeypox outbreak has been reported by 75 countries. Though we have the vaccine for monkeypox still the WHO declared it an international emergency.

Human beings have always been attacked by bacteria and viruses, these are efficient and natural machines having RNA and DNA codes, crores of homosapiens, and our forefathers died, those who survived grew immune. In some cases, we could never develop immunity and the infection becomes seasonal like normal cough and cold. Then we learned to live with them.

In 1918 H1N1 virus (Influenza) created a pandemic in which 5-10 crore people died and a percentage of the population perished. The pandemic weakened slowly in the next 10 years.

The influenza virus family is different from the Coronavirus family. When in 1957-58 H2N2 virus came H1N1 virus vanished naturally.

In 2003 for the first time, the SARS virus attacked human beings but the difference between SARS-COV-1 and SARS-COV-2 (Coronavirus) is that of transmissibility. SARS-COV-2 would only transmit disease to another once fully infected and till the time the patient showed symptoms. Hence this was easy to track and monitor. On the other hand, SARS-COV-2 has evolved itself to start transmitting from day one being asymptomatic till about 2 weeks after which the Coronavirus patient will be identified. This is the reason why SARS-COV-1 was controllable and this makes SARS-COV-2 extremely dangerous. Also, COV-2 has a very high reproduction number.

Swine flu came in 2009 and is also known as the H1N1 virus, is a relatively new strain of an influenza virus that causes symptoms similar to the regular flu. It originated in pigs but is spread primarily from one person to another.

Calamities over the years have come in various forms be it geological, hydrological, meteorological, or biological disasters. Some of them that we have been able to tabulate with historical data are as given in the picture above.

The recent pandemic resulted from our basic economic model which requires us to keep our GDP increasing on the one hand and the more natural resources we annihilate the more zoonotic diseases mankind will face. New threats will emerge from deforestation, more international travel, a rise in meat consumption, and exotic pet keeping which will dominate the health discourse. As we know animals are a reservoir of pathogens and viruses which when exposed will jump species and enter the human body.

Global warming on the other hand is melting permafrost which will expose new microbes, never confronted by mankind. No one as of now has an answer to these problems. Experts feel that this once-in-a-lifetime centennial pandemic will now be repeated every decade hence the solution becomes critical for mankind. To counter this we will have to use “Big Science” to enhance our immune system naturally and scientifically. Never had the entire global village witnessed such a devastating and deeply impactful incident, especially during the second wave in India. It changed lives and caused a major paradigm shift in such a short time. Meanwhile, a new type of reflection has taken place about how our collective experience during this pandemic will impact our world in the future. I am certain Countries across the World are well aware this may not be a stand-alone incident and we will have to brace up our immunity systems and healthcare to face the next one. Here are four hypotheses about what we can learn from the crisis:

• Humans need to be warier in their natural habitat and forests. In India, a large section of our population lives close to and is exposed to forests and wildlife habitats which can be a hotspot of zoonotic diseases.
• Immunity Boosters are here to stay with an increased appreciation of our immunity.
• Politicians and policymakers should start respecting science.
• Healthcare will become part of India’s critical infrastructure.We need to invest in our human and animal health infrastructure and build capacities.