Science For Everyone: Disease X Will Be ‘Highly Lethal’, Like ‘Ebola Transmitted With The Efficiency Of SARS-CoV-2’, Says Expert
Disease X is a term used by the WHO to indicate the disease that will be responsible for the next serious international epidemic. In other words, it is the next unknown disease of epidemic potential.
Disease X: This week, we discuss in detail what Disease X is, what kind of pathogen is likely to cause it, how deadly the disease will be, how the world can prepare itself against the disease, whether it will be deadlier than Covid-19, and whether it can be as lethal as Ebola.
Disease X may claim over 50 million lives, according to Kate Bingham, former chair of the UK Vaccine Task Force, media reports said.
Disease X is a term used by the World Health Organization (WHO) to indicate the disease that will be responsible for the next serious international epidemic. In other words, Disease X is the next unknown disease of epidemic potential.
The pathogen which will be responsible for the next serious international epidemic is currently unknown to cause human disease.
In November 2022, the WHO convened over 300 scientists to discuss Disease X. The scientists are updating the list of priority pathogens that are likely to have devastating socio-economic impact, and require further research. The WHO first published the list in 2017, and updated it in 2018.
The diseases in the current list are Covid-19, Ebola virus disease, Lassa fever, Nipah and henipaviral diseases, Zika virus disease, Crimean-Congo haemorrhagic fever, Marburg virus disease, Middle East respiratory syndrome (MERS), Severe Acute Respiratory Syndrome (SARS), Rift Valley fever, and Disease X. Disease X was included in the list of priority diseases in 2018.
According to a 2021 study published in the journal Infection Control & Epidemiology, a peer-reviewed medical journal published by Cambridge University Press, Richard Hatchett, CEO, Coalition for Epidemic Preparedness Innovations (CEPI), said Disease X night sound like science fiction, but it is something "we must prepare for".
Some experts believed that Covid-19 and Zika met the standards to be classified as the first Disease X. But this is not the case because Disease X will be several times deadlier than Covid-19 or Zika.
“Disease X is an imaginary infectious disease that is both highly transmissible and lethal. Imagine if Ebola transmitted with the efficiency of SARS CoV2,” Dr Anurag Agrawal, Dean, BioSciences and Health Research, Trivedi School of Biosciences, Ashoka University, told ABP Live.
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