Why humanity's assault on nature is making devastating pandemics more likely

UK and Scottish governments were inadequately prepared for the Covid pandemic, according to the UK Covid Inquiry. It found that the administrations had “failed their citizens” by not doing enough to properly plan for the crisis.

Inquiry chair Baroness Hallett said the UK had been “ill-prepared for dealing with a catastrophic emergency, let alone the coronavirus pandemic… Never again can a disease be allowed to lead to so many deaths and so much suffering”.

Strong stuff. And only the beginning. This was the first of at least nine inquiry reports covering everything from political decision-making to vaccines. All of which begs the question, what have we learned from the pandemic? And what steps are we taking to ensure that we do everything in our power to prevent future pandemics?

Thinking back, Covid was like wartime. Entire populations were confined to their homes for their own safety. Governments took stringent measures against an invisible enemy. Like an avalanche gathering momentum and sweeping all before it, the virus engulfed the planet.

Perfect breeding grounds

Although Covid is widely thought to have originated in wildlife, for decades, scientists have been predicting a pandemic originating from farmed animals. Swine flu and highly pathogenic strains of avian influenza, or bird flu, are believed to come from keeping sentient creatures crammed in intensive rearing conditions that provide the perfect breeding ground for novel strains of disease.

Indeed, bird flu is still causing havoc amongst birds, both domestic and wild, as well as a growing list of other species. New and devastating disease outbreaks have become known as ‘black swan’ events.

As humanity continues to destroy the natural world, felling tropical rainforests and erasing pristine habitats, so we come into contact with new species of life, including viruses. This heightens the risk of new black swan events.

Link to ‘cheap’ meat

We cut down trees, cage animals, disrupt ecosystems and separate viruses from their natural hosts. Which means they then look for a new host. Which could be us.

People tend to associate deforestation with logging, or with felling trees to make way for housing and crops for human consumption; in fact, the real driver is the production of feed crops like soya and corn for so-called ‘cheap’ meat.

As I discovered during trips to Brazil and Argentina, vast areas of rainforest and savannah are turned over to these industries for export. It is because so much of the world’s harvest is squandered in feeding perfectly good crops to intensively reared animals that we encroach on more forests, bringing us into contact with a new array of wild animals, plants and viruses.

Prevention better than cure

Public inquiries are right to look at what could have been done better to prevent suffering and deaths during Covid. What is also needed is a rethink to prevent pandemics happening in the first place. Prevention being better than cure.

Sadly, we put ourselves at risk of a fresh pandemic every day, while also loading the dice of sustainability against ourselves. As things stand, we are literally encroaching on our own future.

Philip Lymbery is chief executive of Compassion in World Farming, a former United Nations Food Systems Champion and an award-winning author. His latest book is Sixty Harvests Left: How to Reach a Nature-Friendly Future. Philip is on Twitter @philip_ciwf