‘Disease X’: Decoding the unknown pathogen WHO says could cause a ‘deadlier pandemic’

Days after the World Health Organization (WHO) announced that COVID-19 was no longer a global health emergency, marking an end to the pandemic that claimed millions of lives, experts fear that “Disease X” can lead to an “even deadlier” pandemic. According to the WHO, “Disease X represents the knowledge that a serious international epidemic could be caused by a pathogen currently unknown to cause human disease.” The term, which was coined in 2018, is on WHO’s shortlist of ‘priority diseases’. To prevent and tackle the outbreak of Disease X, experts are clamouring for a rise in funds to support the surveillance of and research into, potential pandemic agents, according to a report in the New York Post.