We’ve heard it before: Eating less meat is better for the planet. In May, China’s health authorities went so far as considering this in their new dietary guidelines, which advised a 50 percent reduction in meat consumption. (It isn’t actually doing anything to enforce this advice, just suggesting it.) The announcement was lauded for its potential impact on stemming climate change and keeping global warming under the levels agreed upon in 2015’s Paris accords.
The notion that we share a collective responsibility, that a change in something as simple as what we consume could move the needle on an accelerating global crisis, was powerful. Yet, hidden in the guidelines was an unanticipated but equally powerful benefit. It’s not just climate change that could stand to benefit from meatless plates. This same action could spark positive change in addressing another defining challenge of our time: pandemic influenza.
In early June, a live bird market in Hong Kong turned up positive for the H7N9 influenza virus, shuttering the market and triggering the destruction of thousands of birds. In April, another worrying signal from the region—a suspected cluster of human cases from eastern China, hinting at possible human to human spread, a pre-condition for pandemic emergence. Authorities are closely watching this virus, wary of the experience from 2009 when an H1N1 virus turned up in Mexico, and within six months, had achieved near global distribution as the first influenza pandemic of the 21st century.
Nearly 20 years ago, Hong Kong was present at the birth of a different influenza virus: H5N1 avian influenza.
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