Wunderry Plus subscribers can listen to USA Today's The Excerpt, ad free right now.

Join Wunderry Plus in the Wundery app.

Hello and welcome to The Excerpt. I'm Dana Taylor. Today is Sunday January 7th, 2024. It's been four years since COVID-19 hit, spreading like wildfire around the globe and taking millions of lives in the process.

While safe and effective vaccines have given us back a sense of normalcy,

are we any better prepared for the next global pandemic? What are the big takeaway lessons from COVID?

And are we confident that nationally and globally

were ready this time around?

USA Today, Health reporter, Karen Weintraub joins us to discuss the issues.

Karen, thanks for joining me.

Thanks for having me.

Okay, so I want to start with the so-called elephant in the room.

What's the likelihood of another global pandemic hitting? in the

next 50 next 25 years, the next 50 years?

So a recent study said that there's about a 2%

chance every year for another pandemic of the same scale we just had, which

means that in the next 25 years there's a 50-50 chance.

The comparison I drew was that by the time Taylor Swift is 60, there's a likelihood

that there'll be another one. 50-50 chance there'll be another one.

Okay, so let's pivot now to a question that's vexed scientists for four years now.

Do we yet know for certain the origin of the virus, was it a lab in China, was it the animal market,

and if we don't know, how can we really

prevent the next virus from coming into existence?

...