Climate change is also changing the geography of diseases. An article earlier this year warned that there could be a “potentially devastating” increase in the number of new pathogens jumping among mammals over the next 50 years. He predicted “a minimum of at least 15,000” new polluting events by 2070, if temperatures rise 2ºC.
“The beginning of the 21st century has been a perfect storm for emerging infectious diseases, and everything points to the likelihood of more and more outbreaks,” Professor Woolhouse said. “All the factors that cause outbreaks get worse, they don’t get better, over time.”
Some experts say the number of new diseases that have affected the UK in the last six months may also be related to the pandemic-related disruption, easing of restrictions and a change in migratory patterns away from Europe after the Brexit.
Since leaving the European Union, extra-EU immigration has grown, with many more people coming from Asia and Africa.
“People going from this country to other countries and coming back are probably the main driver of disease imports,” said Professor Paul Hunter, a professor of medicine at the University of East Anglia.
“The UK is also one of the world’s leading transport hubs,” adds Dr Richard Hatchett, executive director of Cepi (Coalition for Epidemic Preparedness Innovations). “And we’ve recently seen an increase in global transportation after two years of relative inactivity, which allowed infections to spread quickly.”
In February, a baby died of Lassa fever at Bedfordshire Hospital, one of three people who contracted the haemorrhagic virus while in West Africa. A month later, a woman with a history of recent trips to Asia was diagnosed with Crimean-Congo hemorrhagic fever, a related tick-borne virus with a mortality rate of up to 40%.
The rapid global spread of monkeypox (approximately 3,700 confirmed and suspected cases have now been reported outside endemic countries) is also related to travel.