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A new strain of coronavirus first spotted in the UK has sent shockwaves of panic across the world, with many countries halting travel to and from the country. It is reminiscent of the pilot stages of COVID-19, when governments struggled to isolate those infected while searching for their whereabouts.
Today, the scientist who discovered the deadly Ebola disease warns of the emergence of new viruses in the near future, which could hamper your post-pandemic plans.
Professor Jean-Jacques Muyembe Tamfum, who helped discover Ebola in 1976, says an unknown number of viruses, many of which could be far more deadly than the current COVID-19, could emerge across the world, from tropical rainforests in Africa.
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In conversation with CNN, Tamfum warned how we live in a world “where new pathogens will come out.” Tamfum has been searching for more deadly pathogens since the discovery of the deadly Ebola virus.
“And that’s what poses a threat to humanity,” he told CNN, referring to the potential spread of disease from animals to humans.
When Ebola was first discovered, Muyembe was on the front line collecting blood samples from the victims. Ebola is a very fatal disease which causes bleeding and has a very high death rate. When it began to spread, it had killed 88% of those infected, as well as 80% of the staff at a hospital where the disease was first discovered – Yambuku Mission Hospital.
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After the samples were transported to Europe and the United States, scientists discovered a worm-shaped virus. It came to be known as “ebola” because of a nearby river that bore this name, and was also known as Zaire.
Whereas historically Africa has depended on the West for laboratory work. Now, the West must count on Africa to escape possible pandemics that threaten humanity. And if these viruses prove to be as deadly as the Ebola virus, it could lead to unprecedented loss of life.
Muyembe told CNN that zoonotic diseases, which pass from animals to humans, are expected to appear in the near future.
From HIV to SARS to COVID-19 – all of these diseases first started in animals and then spread like the plague among humans. The scientist warned of such diseases to come, saying “Yes, yes, I think,” while suggesting that these could be worse than COVID-19.
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