Hugo Berger
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This article is very good in explaining a pandemic after it starts. But a pandemic can be prevented because it is a man-made problem. Yes, it can, though nobody is making much of an attempt. There is more profit for organized interests in vaccines and Tamiflu and spectre of lots of human illness, which may help hospitals get bigger budgets and more ventilators, for instance. Interests who would benefit from prevention are not organized, but are highly dispersed - it's pretty much everyone.
The last scene of Contagion shows us why the pandemic started: because there are no veterinarians and no enforcement of biosecurity standards in Guangdong (and the rest of the developing world). The contagion comes from livestock or animals for which man is responsible and can control. In the film nobody tells the piggery to keep the bats out. Nobody requires a veterinary inspection before the pig is sold. This would happen in all developed countries, where veterinarians are required to inspect and certify...
Humans have more direct contact with livestock than with wildlife, as in the film pathogens often go from wildlife to livestock to humans.
We don't invest in developing countries' capacity to prevent pandemics at their animal source at all. One severe flu pandemic would cost $3 trillion. With 1% probability in any year, the expected value of the cost is $30 billion per year. It's cost effective for the world community to spend up to that amount for prevention, every year. Since actual spending on animal disease surveillance and control is just about 2% of this, there is ample room to be more rational about prevention.
There is a new report coming out that estimates spending required to bring developing countries veterinary and public health standards associated with One Health is some $3.3 billion per year. This is a number to compare to severe pandemic impact to be prevented ($3 trillion). It's a fraction of the $100 billion spent annually to prevent terrorism, though the risks of pandemics are high and rising. The cost of preventing a pandemic is very cheap insurance.
Unfortunately Warner Brothers is not distributing the Contagion film in developing countries, so 80% of the world's population will not have access to its educational messages. Ironic that this should be so for a film about a pandemic that may well originate there and will hit the poor the hardest.
Perhaps those with the means to improve veterinary services in developing countries will have seen the film.
The viruses know no borders so the defenses have to be in developing countries as well. Early detection and control at the animal source is a highly profitable investment for the whole world.
Interface
This is an excellent article. Also to be noted is that the last scene of Contagion shows us why the pandemic started: because there are no veterinarians and no enforcement of biosecurity standards in Guangdong (and the rest of the developing world). Nobody tells the piggery to keep the bats out. Nobody requires a veterinary inspection before the pig is sold. Humans have more direct contact with livestock than with wildlife. As is shown in the film, pathogens often go from wildlife to livestock to humans.
Nearly all pandemic diseases come from animals. So a pandemic in humans is inevitable if we make little effort to prevent it by disease control in animals.
We don't invest in developing countries' capacity to prevent pandemics at their animal source at all. One severe flu pandemic would cost $3 trillion. With 1% probability in any year, the expected value of the cost is $30 billion per year. It's cost effective for the world community to spend up to that amount for prevention, every year. Since actual spending on animal disease surveillance and control is just about 2% of this, there is ample room to be more rational about prevention.
There is a new report coming out that estimates spending required to bring developing countries veterinary and public health standards associated with One Health is some $3.3 billion per year. This is a number to compare to severe pandemic impact to be prevented ($3 trillion). It's a fraction of the $100 billion spent annually to prevent terrorism, though the risks of pandemics are high and rising. The cost of preventing a pandemic is very cheap insurance.
Unfortunately Warner Brothers is not distributing the Contagion film in developing countries, so 80% of the world's population will not have access to its educational messages. Ironic that this should be so for a film about a pandemic that may well originate there and will hit the poor the hardest.
Hopefully those able to do something about pandemic prevention by financing sustained capacity for disease control in animals in developing countries will have seen the film.
The measures discussed by the medical experts will not prevent a pandemic, they will mitigate it by hopefully preventing some human infections. But as the article notes, the efficacy of these measures may be very limited. For instance, no vaccine for six months, by which time the pandemic will have done great harm, followed by limited vaccine availability. This makes pandemic prevention by control of the disease at the animal source all the more relevant.
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