The Wuhan Coronavirus and Others

While China currently battles a new Coronavirus and the rest of the world waits with bated breath, because it is only a flight away from every corner of the globe, perhaps, we all should be worried about our preparedness for the next big pandemic. An influenza pandemic is no joke or any pandemic for that matter and ought to be taken seriously. By the way this current outbreak in Wuhan, China has been going on since mid-December 2019.

In 1918, the H1N1 Influenza A, colloquially called the Spanish flu, infected 500 million people with 50 million fatalities. A human virus (H1) picked up genetic material from a bird flu virus and voila, a monster virus was created that killed one-third of the world's population at the time. And this continues to happen as viruses mutate and new strains are formed, as we humans insist on eating all manner of animals. 

This current coronavirus is a virus from the same family as the SARS (Severe acute respiratory syndrome) virus and MERS (Middle East respiratory syndrome) virus- the family Coronaviridae. But this Wuhan Coronavirus is a new one. There are no vaccines, nor medications to treat it but scientists as always are working feverishly behind the scenes to come up with a treatment.

But, we must be prepared and hope this is contained soon. And maybe, just maybe, we all need to reconsider our eating choices and lay off the animals, they are also living beings.