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Why the Surge in
Infectious Diseases?
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In the Olivet Prophecy, Jesus Christ predicted the signs that
would precede His return, including pestilence and disease on a global scale -
a parallel prophecy is found in Revelation 6, which describes the Four Horsemen of the Apocalypse
- the fourth horseman pictures the outbreak of pestilences that will ravage a
quarter of the earth’s population.
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by Becky Sweat
Why is the world facing epidemic
after epidemic of new and reemerging infectious diseases?
What are we doing wrong, and how will
the ultimate healing come?
Another virus with a peculiar name always
seems to be lurking around the corner, poised to become the next global health
emergency.
Just in the last few years we’ve witnessed the
Ebola epidemic in western Africa in 2014, MERS outbreaks in the Arabian
Peninsula in 2014 and Korea in 2015, and the spread of the Zika virus
throughout most of the Americas at the close of 2016.
Then the novel coronavirus started spreading
at the end of 2019 and was declared a pandemic by the World Health Organization
(WHO) on March 11, 2020.
At that time 114 countries had reported that
118,000 people had contracted Covid-19 (the disease caused by the novel
coronavirus), and more than 4,000 people had died.
WHO Director-General Tedros Adhanom
Ghebreyesus said, “We expect to see the number of cases, the number of
deaths, and the number of affected countries climb even higher.”
The novel coronavirus
“As Covid-19 is painfully demonstrating, our
interconnected global economy both helps spread new infectious diseases – and,
with its long supply chains, is uniquely vulnerable to the disruption that they
can cause. The ability to get to nearly any spot in the world in 20 hours or
fewer, and pack a virus along with our carry-on luggage, allows new diseases to
emerge and to grow when they might have died out in the past” (“Covid-19: The History of Pandemics”).
Sounding the alarm about infectious
disease epidemics
One of the most urgent warnings came in 2016
from then WHO Director-General Margaret Chan: “What we are seeing now
looks more and more like a dramatic resurgence of the threat from emerging and
re-emerging infectious diseases,” she stated. “The world is not prepared
to cope.”
But what exactly is meant by emerging and reemerging diseases?
An emerging pathogen is one
that is appearing in the human population for the first time and has never been
recognized before.
According to the WHO, at least 40 new
infectious diseases have emerged since the 1980s, at a rate of one or more per
year.
Examples include Ebola, HIV/AIDS and Lyme
disease.
Emerging viruses often have no effective
treatment, cure or vaccine, and the possibility of preventing or controlling
them is extremely limited.
The majority of emerging pathogens are zoonotic—meaning
they are transmitted between animals and people — which makes them particularly
challenging.
“Zoonotic diseases cannot usually be
eradicated due to the fact that it is not possible to eliminate all of the
animal reservoirs or vectors that might be carrying the zoonosis,” explains David Freedman, M.D., professor of
medicine and epidemiology at the University of Alabama.
A reemerging disease is
caused by a virus, bacterium, parasite or fungus that has long existed and was
once thought to be controlled or wiped out, but is now making a comeback.
These diseases are often spreading
geographically, usually in a more virulent or drug-resistant form.
Today there are antibiotic-resistant strains
of tuberculosis, malaria, cholera, diphtheria, staphylococcus, streptococcus
and salmonella — to name a few “superbugs” that have made their debut in recent
times.
Each year, the number of infections and deaths
caused by superbugs continues to rise.
The Review on Antimicrobial
Resistance, a 2016 report published in the U.K., predicts that by
2050, 10 million people globally will die each year from antibiotic-resistant
bacteria alone, based on current trends.
Factors behind the trends
What a contrast to the optimism of 50 years
ago!
Then U.S. Surgeon General William Stewart
famously proclaimed, “The time has come to close the book on infectious
diseases. We have basically wiped out infection in the United States.”
So why are we now seeing a surge in infectious
disease epidemics?
The most straightforward answer comes from the
Bible.
In the Olivet Prophecy, Jesus Christ predicted
the signs that would precede His return, including pestilence and disease on a
global scale (Matthew
24:3-8; Luke 21:11).
A parallel prophecy is found in Revelation 6,
which describes the “Four Horsemen of the Apocalypse.”
The fourth horseman (verses 7 and 8) pictures
the outbreak of pestilences (in addition to the sword and hunger) that will
ravage a quarter of the earth’s population.
The latter part of verse 8 refers to death
resulting from the “beasts of the earth.”
This could very well include the animals that
transmit infectious diseases.
In addition to looking at Bible prophecies, we
can observe specific factors that are helping cause the problems.
Many health experts, like biotech consultant
Thomas Monath, M.D., believe mankind is actually creating its own disease
problems, albeit unintentionally.
“We’re making changes in our environment or
lifestyles to cause the emergence or spread of disease,” he says.
Some of the primary ways humans have paved the
way for modern disease epidemics include:
• Encroachment on animal habitats.
The number of people on planet earth has
soared from 2.5 billion in 1950 to 7.5 billion in 2016. This has prompted
people to settle in wilderness areas where only animals had lived.
“Environments in the developing world used to
be quite remote but are now much less so as a result of human activities like
deforestation, dam projects, irrigation, road construction and extensive
agriculture,” says
James Hughes, M.D., professor of medicine and public health at Emory
University.
When people enter these ecosystems, they often
encounter new pathogens not found anywhere else.
Once infected, they spread the pathogen
wherever they go.
• Urbanization and overcrowding.
Increasing numbers of people, particularly in
the developing world, are moving from rural areas to large urban centers,
seeking work. Many end up living in overcrowded “megacities” with 10 million or
more residents.
According to a 2016 report from the United
Nations Human Settlements Programme, there are now 29 megacities in the world
(up from 14 in 1995), and 79 percent of them are in developing nations.
With high population densities, megacities are
ideal breeding grounds for disease.
Furthermore, the typical megacity’s
infrastructure isn’t prepared to handle its swelling population.
“Water and sanitation systems are often
inadequate or nonexistent, so residents must drink water that’s contaminated
with bacteria and sewage,” Dr.
Freedman says.
“Hospitals may be in short supply, so those
who are ill may not be able to get the medical care they need.”
• Eating exotic animals.
Some cultures have a long tradition of eating
exotic wildlife.
Africa has its bush meat trade, where monkeys,
apes, aardvarks, rats and other wild animals are hunted and sold for food.
The Chinese have their open-air wet markets,
where exotic creatures like civets, snakes, tree shrews, bats, badgers and
pangolins are sold live to consumers, who will then slaughter and consume them.
“Any viruses carried by these animals can be
transmitted to people via consumption, if people handle the animals, or
sometimes if they just come into the same air space,” explains Dr. Hughes.
However, the issue is more than just the
transmission of an animal pathogen to a human.
The ultimate concern is that close contact
with infected animals or consuming them can cause a new pathogen to emerge.
Simply put, if a human infected with a virus
comes in contact with an animal that has a similar type of virus, the genetic
material of the two pathogens can get “mixed up” and recombine.
This can result in a new virus that infects
both animals and people.
This process has caused the emergence of some
of the world’s deadliest diseases.
For instance, HIV is a fusion of the Simian
Immunodeficiency Virus (SIV) that infects monkeys and apes, and a similar type
of virus that infects people.
Scientists believe that HIV originated from
butchering chimpanzees for bush meat.
• Changes in sexual behavior and IV drug
use.
Up until the mid-20th century, having multiple
sexual partners was frowned upon by most people.
However, in Western society today, having
multiple sexual partners before marriage is not only acceptable, but has become
the norm.
Additionally, intravenous drug use has become
rampant, with drug users often sharing injection paraphernalia.
Both trends have fueled the spread of HIV,
hepatitis C, genital herpes and other sexually transmitted diseases — all of
which are transmitted through bodily fluids.
• Improper use of antibiotics.
Overuse of antibiotics has created new
antibiotic-resistant bacteria.
According to the Centers for Disease Control
and Prevention (CDC), up to 50 percent of antibiotics used in hospitals and
clinics are either unnecessary or inappropriate.
Often what happens is patients insist on
having antibiotics when they have a cold or the flu (which is almost always
caused by a virus and won’t respond to antibiotics), and doctors give in to
these demands.
Or physicians might prescribe antibiotics when
they can’t make a definite diagnosis, “just in case” bacteria are present.
Ultimately, disease outbreaks and pandemics
are a result of mankind’s broken relationship with God.
When a particular drug is prescribed too much,
bacteria can build defenses against it.
Dr. Hughes explains, “This drug resistance
is then transferred to the next generation of that bacteria, effectively
rendering that particular medication useless.”
Bacteria can develop resistance to multiple
drugs, eventually becoming the virtually untreatable, so-called superbugs.
Biblical perspectives on disease and
health
Several of the factors just discussed are
direct violations of biblical instruction.
For one, Leviticus 11 and Deuteronomy 14 spell
out which animals should and shouldn’t be eaten.
Many of the diseases plaguing our modern world
wouldn’t be problems if people weren’t eating “unclean,” exotic animals, which
carry disease-causing organisms not present in domesticated “clean” animals.
Deuteronomy 23:13 says that human waste
should be buried away from where people live.
This prevents food and water supplies from
becoming contaminated.
It’s no wonder that diseases like diarrhea, dysentery,
hookworm, roundworms, cholera and typhoid — which all result from contact with
human waste — are rampant in shantytowns that do not have sanitation systems.
In Leviticus 18 and 20 God prohibits
extramarital and premarital sex and other unhealthy sexual practices.
There’s no question that this kind of sexually
immoral behavior has contributed greatly to the spread of AIDS and other
sexually transmitted diseases.
Ultimately, disease outbreaks and pandemics
are a result of mankind’s broken relationship with God.
When God brought the Israelites out of Egypt,
He told them they could avoid the curse of disease if they obeyed His
commandments and statutes (Exodus
15:26).
On the other hand, there would be consequences
for disobedience, which included disease epidemics (Deuteronomy 28:15, 21-22, 27-28).
The Israelites — like all people before and
since — disobeyed God, and mankind continues to reap the consequences of sin.
Today, humanity as a whole is cut off from God
and vulnerable to the ravages of disease. This won’t always be the case though.
When Jesus Christ returns to earth and the
Kingdom of God is established, mankind will at last be united with our Creator
and receive all the blessings of living God’s way of life — which includes good
health and a world free of disease outbreaks.
Becky Sweat is a member of the Church of God, a Worldwide
Association.
