Get ready for ‘Disease X’

HEALTH Minister Terrence Deyalsingh has eyes on a new target.

At a workshop hosted by the Caribbean Public Health Agency (Carpha), Mr Deyalsingh said in the wake of covid19, his ministry was taking steps to get ready for “Disease X.” Disease X is a placeholder name adopted by the World Health Organization (WHO) for the next global pandemic, whether borne by animals or meals.

“Every individual we lose in a small island developing state is a loss,” the minister said during his feature address at the event, held on November 18 in Port of Spain. “We have to tackle the issue of zoonotic diseases and foodborne diseases.”

Mr Deyalsingh disclosed two government ministries and UWI are setting up a laboratory system for genomic sequencing; TT is joining an international initiative to prevent the outbreak of pandemics while ensuring food security; and ministry officials are gathering learning from the US Centers for Disease Control (CDC) – while they still can – to implement systems to track, trace and surveil.

These efforts are overdue.

Whatever the origins of covid19 – be it a lab leak or a natural development involving bats – the climate crisis is enhancing pathways for zoonotic disease.

And our major tools of defence are being undermined.

Donald Trump’s pick for US health secretary, Robert F Kennedy Jr, is an anti-vaxxer who falsely believes jabs cause autism. Mr Trump, who withdrew America from the WHO in his first term, has also named television personality and promoter of quack medicine Dr Mehmet Oz to his cabinet. Alarm bells are ringing within the global health system.

The US president-elect’s appointments, however, mirror increasing pushback globally against science.

We have seen this locally with Opposition Leader Kamla Persad-Bissessar recently calling the covid19 vaccine, which she took, “fake.”

Even before the UNC leader’s comments, though, the PNM government, at the height of the pandemic, struggled to fight against a tide of misinformation on inoculation and the virus. When the next epidemic comes, things will be worse.

But what makes figures like Mr Kennedy and Dr Oz a clear and present danger, however, is the impact the veneration of their views has not only on willingness to take new vaccines, but also old, longstanding ones for which there are decades of scientific proof. We may be entering a precarious phase.

Separately, antibiotic resistance is at an alarming level and the risk posed by bio-weapons looms, given several simultaneous spheres of warfare and conflict.

As noted by Carpha this week, foodborne illnesses are also prevalent the world over, including the Caribbean, where almost one in ten is affected during large gatherings.

South Africa, on November 21, declared a sudden surge in such maladies a national disaster.

The time to prepare is now.