There’s an unwritten rule in publishing, or so I’m told: Don’t write about Covid. Our collective attention span is saturated by limitless months spent standing in attics and cramped corners of apartments, watching a world we cannot take part in. When the worst of it was over, we felt the urge to shut the chapter, to place it behind a heavy latch.
But in doing so, we also take away the hard-won lessons of the moment: how quickly the system unravels, how 20 years of coronavirus warnings Deposit without proper preparationand the way we depend on security will be the next disaster.
This is now giving rise to a different threat: highly pathogenic avian influenza, often called bird flu.
Bird flu continues to be a low risk of everlasting human transmission. But it doesn’t harm the virus. There are H5 viruses Brutally deadly About 900,000 birds have died outright, and a whole bunch of tens of millions have been culled to regulate the spread. A dangerous spread of the virus reaches mammals. So far, at the very least 74 mammal species, from elephant seals to polar bears, have died.
Individual cases are situated inside a broader shift. Dense poultry farms create opportunities for hop species of viruses. multiple A thousand American dairy herds have tested positive prior to now two years, and viral fragments have also been detected in milk. A troubling path Every leap of spill is an exploration of recent steps.
Europe is Also looking at an increase. From early September to mid-November 2025, 1,444 infected wild birds were present in 26 countries: a quadrupling of the previous 12 months.
Human affairs remain rare: only 992 H5N1 infections have been confirmed worldwide since 2003, albeit with a near-50% mortality rate. But the number is increasing.
The U.S. has logged 75 cases since 2022, and in November, the U.S. recorded its First H5N5 death In a patient with existing health problems. And although no human cases have been reported in Europe, the European Center for Disease Prevention and Control Warning That the wide circulation of animals increases the chance of spillage.
My research focuses on how warnings fall before disasters, from geopolitical shocks to intelligence failures and industrial accidents. The pattern is usually the identical. Front-line observers quickly detect something, but when it’s diluted by bureaucracy, competing interpretations, or institutional oblivion, the signal is lost.
Another tragic example is the recent fire in Hong Kong: the residents of Wang Fook Court Several alarms were raised Concerns about styrofoam boards that flared up in the shape of flimsy, unsubstantiated traps and neglected safety notices never gained traction.
The failures I study share recurring blind spots: noise, weak signals drowned out by bureaucratic habits that decelerate or soften uncomfortable messages, and the political instinct to downplay problems that threaten established narratives. When you view an alert as a sequence running from detection to decision, Falling is often partial. Some have connections. Others are stuck once they need it most.
Bird flu now sits inside such a sequence. The technical ability to detect the change is there: veterinarians, virologists and surveillance systems are picking up signals, sequencing viruses and logging outbreaks. But the infrastructure is supposed to catch the virus in its early stages fraying. Agencies once charting the landscape of emerging pandemic danger have been gutted — budgets trimmed, staff evaporated.
Zuma Press, Inc
Monitoring Faults
A study of 31 European countries warned that Covid had exposed “Critical Differences in Preparation” and emphasized standardized indicators and open data as the idea for any future response. The European Union has just begun Pre-Pandemic Planning step, nevertheless it cannot mask the gulf in day-to-day monitoring and response that also leaves countries exposed.
Across the Atlantic, deduction has left the US Centers for Disease Control and Prevention. US scientists warn that federal reporting has declined: United States Department of Agriculture shared Little genetic data on the outbreak in cattle and other infected animals was released late, and in formats researchers couldn’t use. This left scientists unable to find out how the virus was evolving or spreading through the herd.
i Great Britaindomestic surveillance capability has been equally under pressure, with low access to European disease intelligence and chronic VET shortages undermining early detection.
Once the signal fades contained in the institutions, it also fades to the general public. And a weak warning rarely travels far.
A recent one Pool It shows the plain: Most Americans don’t even register bird flu as a reputable threat. What doesn’t assistance is that symptoms in humans may be so mild that they slide past notice. a Case Earlier this 12 months the dairy employee looked like nothing greater than conjunctivitis.
None of this implies a brand new pandemic is imminent. Health officials still say effective human-to-human transmission is feasible is less. These viruses rarely make this jump. And we are usually not helpless. we’re Better prepared Before we were before Covid: We have vaccine candidates, clear protocols and agencies that learn painful lessons.
But none the less. And if it were to occur, the implications could possibly be disastrous. Most people have some immunity to seasonal flu strains. We probably have None On H5.
And influenza doesn’t confine itself to the weak like Covid often did. Past flu epidemics killed large numbers of otherwise healthy adults. Increasing concern, health skills themselves Attackedundermining the very authority that carries out the signals.
If we avert our eyes from the specter of bird flu because our system is underprepared, underfunded and unprepared, we risk repeating the identical pattern. And the subsequent alarm will arrive too late for anyone to pretend they didn’t see it coming.