Since COVID was first reported in December 2019, there have been more than 775 million recorded infections and more than 7 million deaths from the disease. This makes COVID the seventh-deadliest pandemic in recorded history.
Factors including climate change, disruption of animal habitats, poverty and global travel mean we’re only likely to see more pandemics in the future.
It’s impossible to predict exactly when the next pandemic will happen, or what it will be. But experts around the world are working to prepare for this inevitable “disease X”.
