Top Covid expert in China gearing up for next global pandemic

Global Pandemic Preparedness: Amidst New Covid-19 Variants, Scientists and Doctors Anticipate Future Threats, Emphasizing Climate Change’s Role in Disease Mutation and Spread. Their focus is not just on current threats but mainly on how climate change could influence the mutation and spread of infectious diseases. Zhang Wenhong, director of China’s National Medical Centre for Infectious Diseases, stated, “After the end of the recent coronavirus pandemic, the whole world is actually preparing for the next global pandemic.”

In 2020, Zhang became a prominent figure in China’s fight against COVID-19 as the leader of Shanghai’s clinical expert team. He has published many papers related to public health and infectious diseases. Now, he is taking on a new initiative to address the link between climate change and infectious diseases.

Impact of Climate Change on Global Pandemic Landscape

Zhang highlighted that research is increasingly looking at how a warming climate indirectly affects the mutation and spread of pathogens. This research is becoming a global focus as the planet’s climate changes.

For example, a study published in the Journal of Geophysical Research: Atmospheres in 2020 found that ocean surface warming in subtropical regions is expanding the width of the tropics. Zhang explained, “The reservoir of bacteria and viruses is expanding as the Earth warms.” This expansion allows pathogens and their carriers, like ticks and mosquitoes, to thrive in more areas, exposing more animals and humans to infections.

In the United States, diseases spread by ticks, such as encephalitis and Lyme disease, are on the rise. In China, mosquito-borne dengue fever is appearing in new areas. “It has been expanding from near the south – the more tropical areas – towards the north, and now it has also begun to expand to the Yangtze River Basin. So we can now also detect dengue fever in the Yangtze River Basin,” Zhang said. In Southeast Asia and Africa, malaria cases remain high, and climate change plays a significant role. The World Health Organization (WHO) has warned that climate change will influence the spread of vector-borne diseases like malaria due to changing temperature and precipitation patterns.

The assumptions are that the Covid-19 pandemic may have spread from bats, whose habitats are expanding. As northern regions like Alaska warm, Zhang noted, “some species that have not emerged before may enter our human society,” including ancient bacteria and fungi. “So the work we are doing now is actually for the next pandemic.”

Global cooperation and data sharing is essential for preparedness of pandemic. Scientists need to provide enough data and evidence to help create global disease management strategies. Zhang, as director of the Shanghai Sci-Tech Inno Centre, signed an agreement with the University of Hong Kong (HKU) to pursue this goal. Experts in climate change, public health, infectious disease control, and public policy will collaborate at HKU’s Centre on Contemporary China and the World (CCCW). They aim to conduct original research, establish monitoring systems, and provide platforms for public policy discussions.

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