According to Dr. Gregor, mass-produced chickens for food are often kept in tight spaces and can be one of the ideal sources for viral diseases such as bird flu.
As the world tries to cope with the novel coronavirus (COVID-19 pandemic), a scientist has claimed that worse is yet to come. According to Dr. Michael Greger, an American nutrition expert, the next pandemic would be caused by virus originating from poultry farms. The novel coronavirus has made its way to every corner of the world. The virus has infected more than 6.26 million individuals around the world and has killed more than 375,513 people across the globe. In recent history, this has been one of the worst pandemics to hit the world.
Dr. Greger also noted that the new pandemic could be 100 times worse than the current pandemic and might kill one in two infected individuals. The coronaviruses are spreading around the world from the past two decades. They cause respiratory tract infections that can range from mild to deadly. The recent one is the novel coronavirus named SARS-CoV-2 that has become a significant threat for most countries. The novel coronavirus belongs to the same family of viruses that are responsible for the Severe Acute Respiratory Syndrome (SARS) and the Middle East Respiratory Syndrome (MERS) outbreaks, but its unique characteristics are still uncertain.
According to Dr. Gregor, mass-produced chickens for food are often kept in tight spaces and can be one of the ideal sources for viral diseases such as bird flu. In 1997, the bird flu (H5N1) outbreak had taken place in Hong Kong and killed around 675,000 individuals in the United States alone. There have been several outbreaks since then between 2003 and 2009. Dr. Gregor also noted that in China, despite several efforts to eliminate the virus, there had been many bird flu outbreaks. However, millions of chickens have been slaughtered to curb the spread of the virus. The bird’s poop is rich in ammonia, an ideal situation where the viruses can multiply, mutate, and spread.