The chief of the World Health Organisation has cautioned that a disease more deadlier than Covid might strike at any time.

A new public health emergency could not be “kicked down the road,” Dr. Tedros Adhanom Ghebreyesus said at the World Health Assembly meeting on May 22.

In addition, he asserted that even though the pandemic’s worst days were over, a Covid variation capable of starting the planet over from scratch may yet arise.

In Geneva, Switzerland, Dr Tedros said : ‘The threat of another variant emerging that causes new surges of disease and death remains. And the threat of another pathogen emerging with even deadlier potential remains.’

He was speaking as the WHO unveiled a new global scheme to spot and track the most dangerous pathogens at an annual meeting of its 194 member states.

No specific diseases were named. But ‘Disease X’ — a place-holder given to a devastating pathogen not yet discovered — is on the UN agency’s list of pressing threats.

Dr Tedros’ comments come after the WHO earlier this month declared that Covid was no longer a public health emergency of international concern.  Instead, the virus is now considered an ‘established and ongoing health issue’.

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