The Coronavirus which causes COVID-19 disease has affected the entire world with cases still on an exponential rise. Its now been almost six months since the first case emerged in the city of Wuhan, China. The whole world is now onto a desperate search of a good viable treatment and ultimately the vaccine which shall help us all get out of this nightmare-like situation.
Economies are historically down, the aviation and travel industry have come to a standstill, education has moved completely online, retail and real estate is witnessing its steepest decline, many industries are on a verge of completely shutting down, doctors and front-line workers are facing the maximum heat, people are dying and with which many families are getting destroyed and much more on bigger scale is happening all around us and will happen if a fix is not found. The world has literally come to a halt.
Recently I came about a few articles from a few established sources about, how there is a clear link between climate change and pandemics and epidemics. One of those was by Hindustan Times, as they had an interview with a veterinary epidemiologist from University of California Davis, Dr. Pranav Pandit, as he stated that, “There is scientific evidence linking climate change with pandemics like Covid-19. Because the world is more interconnected than ever through travel and trade, it is likely that we will see pandemics at an increasing rate.” (You can read the research paper here)
As we invade the forests, many of such deadly viruses which are already there in the animals and birds, will come in contact with us which will eventually lead to a transfer of those into humans which then could mutate to form a new strain of virus. According to Dr. Pandit, this rate could likely increase if we continue with the same amount of deforestation and wildlife exploitation, be it for any purpose, in the near future.
Its really saddening that within these 20 years itself we have witnessed 3-4 major epidemics and now this one is on our heads. I really don’t know where we as species are heading towards and what our definition of progress is but one thing is sure, if we continue with this trend then there is a much higher chance of a climate catastrophe than any kind of epidemic. Its high time that we learn from our past mistakes, evolve, create new definitions of progress and development and ultimate act now to bring in some strict population control measures to survive and make this only life sustaining planet more livable.
Knowcusp 