Pandemics will be the cause of average annual economic losses of 0.7% of global GDP – or $570 billion – a threat similar in scale to that estimated for climate change in the coming decades
January 27th, 2019“……While potentially catastrophic outbreaks may occur only every few decades, highly disruptive regional and local outbreaks are becoming more common and pose a major threat to lives and livelihoods. Recent years have seen nearly 200 epidemic events per year. This trend is only expected to intensify due to increasing trade, travel, population density, human displacement, deforestation and climate change. Further, the number and diversity of epidemic events (e.g. influenza, Ebola, Zika, yellow fever, SARS, MERS-CoV and antibiotic-resistant bacteria, among other threats) have been increasing over the past 30 years.….”