Beyond COVID-19: predictions for future pandemics

On the evening of Thursday 7 March 2024 RSC Belgium member and friends were treated to a hugely informative and entertaining talk entitled 'Beyond COVID-19: predictions for future pandemics' at the British School of Brussels in Tervuren from Professor Marc Van Ranst, Professor of Virology at KULeuven and the Rega Institute for Medical Research. Marc was a very prominent figure in the Belgian media during the COVID-19 pandemic.

In 2007, Marc (pictured above with RSC Belgium chair Bob Crichton) had been appointed as Interministerial commissioner by the Belgian federal government to prepare Belgium for an influenza pandemic and in 2009 he was an interministerial commissary for crisis management during the Mexican flu pandemic. During the COVID-19 pandemic, Marc was a member of both the Belgian 'Risk Assessment Group' (RAG), which analysed the risks of coronavirus SARS-CoV-2 for public health, and of the 'Scientific committee Coronavirus' which advised Belgian health authorities on combatting the virus and which made - and continues to make - prognoses on its evolution and spread in Belgium.

The emergence of future pandemics is an important concern, given the unpredictability observed in past outbreaks. While pandemics are rare events, several quasi-certitudes can guide our predictions Marc said. There is a high likelihood that the next pandemic may originate in Asia, particularly in densely populated urban centres. The role of air travel in facilitating the rapid spread of infectious diseases cannot be underestimated. Furthermore, zoonotic transmission, where diseases jump from animals to humans, remains a significant risk factor for future pandemics. The likelihood that a next pandemic will be caused by a rapidly mutating RNA virus is also very high.

The mode of transmission through respiratory droplets will be a key factor to consider when preparing for and responding to future global health crises.

By exploring these predictions and understanding the commonalities among past pandemics, Marc was able to show how we can be better equipped to mitigate risks, enhance preparedness strategies, and safeguard global health security in the face of future infectious disease threats.

Marc indicated that the actual global death toll from the COVID pandemic was of the order of  22 million compared to the official recorded global toll of 6.5 million. He also showed, via data on COVID in wastewater, that the virus was very much still with us during winter 2023-24, with current variants being highly transmissible but not causing such serious infection in terms of admissions to intensive care and mortality. 

The development and deployment of effective vaccines had been key to limiting serious infections and death: the difference in mortality between states in the US which encouraged and enabled vaccination and those that were less enthusiastic was clear. 

Marc also described his personal experiences in the face of antivax campaigners - a most disturbing situation that brought threats of physical violence against him and his family quite literally to his doorstep and at one point required his family to go into close police protection.  

Marc's conclusion was also just as disturbing - that we are not ready for the next, inevitable, pandemic. 

Marc's presentation can be viewed below.