{"id":20041034,"date":"2020-11-04T12:30:07","date_gmt":"2020-11-04T07:00:07","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.thethirdpole.net\/?p=41034"},"modified":"2021-03-08T16:29:51","modified_gmt":"2021-03-08T10:59:51","slug":"could-the-himalayas-harbour-the-next-pandemic","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/dialogue.earth\/en\/nature\/could-the-himalayas-harbour-the-next-pandemic\/","title":{"rendered":"Could the Himalayas harbour the next pandemic?"},"content":{"rendered":"

The world is in an \u201cera of pandemics\u201d. Unless the destruction of the natural world is halted, diseases will emerge more often, spread more rapidly, kill more people and affect the global economy with more devastating impacts than ever before. This was the stark warning from the world\u2019s leading scientists in a major new report<\/a> last week.
\nAlmost all pandemics are caused by zoonoses, diseases that spread from animals to humans, such as Covid-19, HIV, Sars, Ebola and bird flu. These are being driven entirely by our destruction of the environment, particularly cutting down forests, the intensification of agriculture and wildlife trade, the experts said. This has brought people into closer contact with animals and made it more likely that new viruses will emerge and spill over into human populations.
\n\u201cThe risk of pandemics is increasing rapidly, with more than five new diseases emerging in people every year, any one of which has the potential to become a pandemic,\u201d wrote the group of experts convened by the UN\u2019s\u00a0Intergovernmental Science-Policy Platform on Biodiversity and Ecosystem Services<\/a>.
\nThere are an estimated 1.7 million undiscovered viruses on the planet circulating in mammals and birds, of which about 700,000 could have the potential to infect humans.
\n\u201cThere is no great mystery about the cause of the Covid-19 pandemic, or of any modern pandemic,\u201d said Peter Daszak<\/a>, the chair of the group. \u201cThe same human activities that drive climate change and biodiversity loss also drive pandemic risk through their impacts on our environment.\u201d
\nThe current approach of trying to contain outbreaks and search for treatments and vaccines is a \u201cslow and uncertain path\u201d, argue the group of 22 leading experts from every continent \u2013 including health experts, ecologists and economists.
\nInstead, they call for a \u201ctransformative approach\u201d that addresses the root causes of the outbreak rather than the economic and health symptoms. This includes stopping deforestation for agriculture, cattle farms and palm oil, shifting our consumption patterns and tackling climate change.<\/p>\n

\"Cyclone
Women in a school designated as a cyclone shelter, but now being used as a Covid-19 quarantine centre, in Kulagachi village of Deulia Panchayat in the northern part of the Sundarbans [image courtesy Sundarban TV]<\/figcaption><\/figure>Their proposed solutions include setting up an intergovernmental council on pandemic prevention to provide decision-makers with the best science and design a global surveillance network. They also call for stronger conservation of high-biodiversity areas and for governments to promote more sustainable consumption \u2013 for example, putting a tax on meat production and consumption. They also urge policymakers to incorporate health risks into major development and land-use projects, and to factor the economic costs of pandemics into government policies.
\nThe costs of a preventative approach would be \u201ctrivial\u201d compared with the trillions of dollars of damage caused by Covid-19 alone, the experts found.<\/p>\n

Climate change in the Himalayas<\/h2>\n

The report shines a spotlight on the links between land degradation, climate change and emerging diseases. Climate change is the \u201celephant in the room\u201d, said Daszak during a virtual media conference. \u201cIt is already driving pandemics and will worsen the spread of future diseases.\u201d
\nThe warming of the planet is changing patterns of disease.
\n\u201cThere is clear and strong evidence that climate change is leading to a shift in vector-borne diseases. In Europe, for instance, tick-borne encephalitis has moved further north because of climate warming. Lyme disease and bluetongue has also reached Europe,\u201d said Daszak. \u00a0Research shows the warmer, wetter weather brought by climate change is heightening the risk of Ebola<\/a> outbreaks across Africa.
\n\u201cClimate change also leads to shifts in the geographic range of species, livestock and people \u2013 we are already seeing migration because of climate stresses \u2013 and that will spread diseases more effectively,\u201d said Daszak.<\/p>\n

Biodiversity hotspots in the Himalayas<\/h2>\n

Diseases tend to come from the edges of tropical rainforests and places of great diversity, where humans and animals mingle. These \u201chotspots\u201d, where diseases are more likely to spill over from animals to humans, are closely linked to degradation of landscape, such as deforestation.
\nDavid Hayman, professor of infectious disease ecology at Massey University, New Zealand, and co-author of the report, said, \u201cThese hotspots are at the intersection of high biodiversity and high human and livestock density.\u201d Existing work has been done at the global level and in sub-Saharan Africa and Asia.<\/p>\n

\"Heat
Heat map showing locations predicting locations most at risk from zoonotic emerging infectious diseases (Republished under a Creative Commons license: Nature Communications, 2017).<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n

The Hindu Kush Himalayas \u2013 which stretches from Afghanistan in the west to China in the east over some of the world\u2019s most biodiverse areas \u2013 is one of these potential emerging disease hotspots, according to Nakul Chettri, biodiversity expert and regional programme manager at the International Centre for Integrated Mountain Development (ICIMOD),\u00a0a research institute based in Nepal.
\n\u201cFirst, the HKH is bestowed with a wide range of wildlife species, which brings higher risk of diseases,\u201d he said. \u201cSecond, the region hosts four out of 36 global biodiversity hotspots, has lost 70% of original habitat<\/a> and faces acute human pressure. There are higher chances of human-wildlife interaction due to habitat fragmentation, wildlife trade, bushmeat-eating practices and traditional domestic animals being replaced with hybrids, which are more susceptible to diseases.\u201d
\nSee:<\/strong> Without communities, conservation fails in eastern Himalayas<\/a>
\nInterestingly, habitat destruction means only the hardiest species \u2013 such as bats and rats, more likely to carry diseases \u2013 survive. For example, the multimammate mouse in West Africa that carries Lassa virus<\/a> thrives in degraded land around plantations.
\nThe HKH region is also warming up to three times faster than the global average. This creates a perfect storm for new diseases to emerge.
\nClimate change<\/a> is known to be driving the spread of Zika in the HKH Himalayan region, compounded by the high levels of population density, poverty and unplanned urbanisation. Warmer temperatures are also pushing mosquito-borne diseases like dengue into higher altitudes. While these are not new viruses, they are spreading into new areas where people have no natural immunity and interacting with trends such as deforestation<\/a> in ways that are poorly understood.<\/p>\n

\"A
A view of deforestation in the middle Himalayas [image courtesy: Akhtar H Malik, Kashmir University]<\/figcaption><\/figure>There is still little research on how climate change will shape the future risk of pandemics. This is particularly important in the HKH region \u2013 where there is growing evidence of animals<\/a> and plants shifting habitats and moving into new ranges. And people are already on the move, forced on by rising sea levels, storms, river erosion and lack of fresh water.
\nA handful of \u201cvirus hunters\u201d \u2013 the glamorous name for epidemiologists who find potentially dangerous pathogens \u2013 are already working in the region. US scientists recently discovered new coronaviruses from bat caves\u00a0in Myanmar<\/a>; and an Indian scientist<\/a> is studying diseases in wildlife and livestock in the Himalayas.
\nBut hunting for the next virus could be a long shot. Restoring degraded, fragmented areas is the most important thing. Chettri from ICIMOD argued that conservation efforts by countries of the HKH region are essential to mitigate disease risks.
\n\u201cWe need to keep the space for wildlife and biodiversity to thrive\u2026 It is high time [we] invest in the restoration of natural habitats that we have lost over the last century. This is crucial for the long-term well-being of humanity in the HKH.\u201d
\nHe called on countries to \u201cmove forward with a green development agenda\u201d, invest in green enterprises such as ecotourism and organic farming and educate the youth in maintaining an ecological balance.
\nThere have been some positive noises about building back greener in Pakistan, but amid the economic fallout from Covid-19<\/a> this will be a long and arduous path.
\nIn the meantime, how can countries best prepare for the next pandemic?\u00a0Chettri rattled off a list of actions: \u201cAmong many things, invest in rural health facilities in remote areas; minimise human-wildlife interaction, keep wild habitat and their migratory routes intact and restore degraded areas; ban wildlife trade and bushmeat; encourage traditional livestock rather than hybrids and invest in research to understand the types of disease-causing organisms.\u201d<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

Environmental destruction and climate change are driving pandemics, with the Hindu Kush Himalayas a potential hotspot for new emerging diseases<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":581,"featured_media":20056036,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_acf_changed":false,"footnotes":""},"categories":[761,764],"tags":[551,20000022],"hashtags":[],"country":[20000116,20027489,20000111,20000113],"class_list":["post-20041034","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-climate","category-nature","tag-health","tag-himalayas","country-bangladesh","country-bhutan","country-india","country-nepal"],"acf":[],"yoast_head":"\nCould the Himalayas harbour the next pandemic? | Dialogue Earth<\/title>\n<meta name=\"description\" content=\"Environmental destruction and climate change are driving pandemics, with the Hindu Kush Himalayas a potential hotspot for new emerging diseases\" \/>\n<meta name=\"robots\" content=\"index, follow, max-snippet:-1, max-image-preview:large, max-video-preview:-1\" \/>\n<link rel=\"canonical\" href=\"https:\/\/dialogue.earth\/en\/nature\/could-the-himalayas-harbour-the-next-pandemic\/\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:locale\" content=\"en_US\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:type\" content=\"article\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:title\" content=\"Could the Himalayas harbour the next pandemic?\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:description\" content=\"Environmental destruction and climate change are driving pandemics, with the Hindu Kush Himalayas a potential hotspot for new emerging diseases\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:url\" content=\"https:\/\/dialogue.earth\/en\/nature\/could-the-himalayas-harbour-the-next-pandemic\/\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:site_name\" content=\"Dialogue Earth\" \/>\n<meta property=\"article:published_time\" content=\"2020-11-04T07:00:07+00:00\" \/>\n<meta property=\"article:modified_time\" content=\"2021-03-08T10:59:51+00:00\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:image\" content=\"https:\/\/dialogue.earth\/content\/uploads\/2020\/11\/deforestation-Tawang-Arunachal-Pradesh-Himalayas-India-scaled.jpg\" \/>\n\t<meta property=\"og:image:width\" content=\"2560\" \/>\n\t<meta property=\"og:image:height\" content=\"1600\" \/>\n\t<meta property=\"og:image:type\" content=\"image\/jpeg\" \/>\n<meta name=\"author\" content=\"Beth Walker\" \/>\n<meta name=\"twitter:card\" content=\"summary_large_image\" \/>\n<script type=\"application\/ld+json\" class=\"yoast-schema-graph\">{\"@context\":\"https:\/\/schema.org\",\"@graph\":[{\"@type\":\"Article\",\"@id\":\"https:\/\/dialogue.earth\/en\/nature\/could-the-himalayas-harbour-the-next-pandemic\/#article\",\"isPartOf\":{\"@id\":\"https:\/\/dialogue.earth\/en\/nature\/could-the-himalayas-harbour-the-next-pandemic\/\"},\"author\":{\"name\":\"Beth Walker\",\"@id\":\"https:\/\/dialogue.earth\/en\/#\/schema\/person\/697038c567af68386b9b2acf2eb79870\"},\"headline\":\"Could the Himalayas harbour the next pandemic?\",\"datePublished\":\"2020-11-04T07:00:07+00:00\",\"dateModified\":\"2021-03-08T10:59:51+00:00\",\"mainEntityOfPage\":{\"@id\":\"https:\/\/dialogue.earth\/en\/nature\/could-the-himalayas-harbour-the-next-pandemic\/\"},\"wordCount\":1358,\"commentCount\":1,\"publisher\":{\"@id\":\"https:\/\/dialogue.earth\/en\/#organization\"},\"image\":{\"@id\":\"https:\/\/dialogue.earth\/en\/nature\/could-the-himalayas-harbour-the-next-pandemic\/#primaryimage\"},\"thumbnailUrl\":\"https:\/\/dialogue.earth\/content\/uploads\/2020\/11\/deforestation-Tawang-Arunachal-Pradesh-Himalayas-India-scaled.jpg\",\"keywords\":[\"Health\",\"Himalayas\"],\"articleSection\":[\"Climate\",\"Nature\"],\"inLanguage\":\"en\",\"potentialAction\":[{\"@type\":\"CommentAction\",\"name\":\"Comment\",\"target\":[\"https:\/\/dialogue.earth\/en\/nature\/could-the-himalayas-harbour-the-next-pandemic\/#respond\"]}]},{\"@type\":\"WebPage\",\"@id\":\"https:\/\/dialogue.earth\/en\/nature\/could-the-himalayas-harbour-the-next-pandemic\/\",\"url\":\"https:\/\/dialogue.earth\/en\/nature\/could-the-himalayas-harbour-the-next-pandemic\/\",\"name\":\"Could the Himalayas harbour the next pandemic? 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