Preparing for the Future: Lessons from COVID.
Dr. Peter Hotez, dean of the National School of Tropical Medicine at Baylor College of Medicine, warns that COVID-19 is not a one-off and that pandemics and health threats will become part of the new normal. He stresses the need to address anti-vaccine rhetoric and other forms of misinformation, which contributed to the unnecessary deaths of more than 40,000 Texans and ultimately 200,000 Americans. Hotez also highlights the importance of preparing for future pandemics, including avian and zoonotic influenzas, tropical infectious diseases, and vector-borne diseases. He calls for a higher-level investment to develop countermeasures against these threats and to recognize disease as economic and security threats.