Health experts have listed four potentially dealy viruses that could spark the next pandemic in the UK. A quartet of pathogens have been narrowed down by the UK Health Security Agency (UKHSA) which are currently circulating. This includes measles-like viruses that have the potential to be “considerably more dangerous than Covid”.
This comes as the government has announced the launch of a reference document that will be continually updated, informing scientists with the latest threats. The new viruses identified may be “impossible to control by even the strictest lockdown”, a leading scientist warns. One pathogen causing great concern is that of the Picornaviridae family. This triggers polio-like diseases which includes a virus called acute flaccid myelitis (AFM), a rare condition which causes muscle weakness and paralysis.
In January, shocking BBC reports show a 15-year-old boy in the UK town of Rochdale becoming paralysed by the AFM virus.
As well as this, the Paramyxoviridae family may also have the potential to cause nationwide lockdowns, health chiefs have warned. This includes viruses like the commonly known measles and mumps, as well as respiratory tract infections. However, it also includes the Nipah virus which causes brain swelling and death – this can be spread from bats or pigs to humans.
Large measles outbreaks have been reported across the globe, with the highest record since 2012 present in England last year, standing at 2,911 cases.
The disease, typically affecting children, can include pneumonia, vision loss, eye swelling and brain inflammation which can cause seizures, hearing loss and even brain damage.
“A novel measles-like virus would pose a threat far worse than Covid,” Mark Woolhouse, professor of infectious diseases at the University of Edinburgh, told The Mirror.
“Such a virus would have a much higher R number than the original variants of Covid – making it impossible to control by even the strictest lockdown.”
Other viruses on the flagged list by health experts include coronaviruses such as Covid-19 and MERS.
Cases of bird flu, belonging to the Orthomyxoviridae family, are also worryingly on the increase.
Jumping from species, the illness has been detected in a British farmer who reportedly had contact with infected birds. The disease killed its first human in January in the US – a 65-year-old with health issues, also exposed to wild birds.
Alarmingly, the disease was detected in sheep in northern England this week for the the first time.
