A global pandemic could kill more people than nuclear war, Joe Lieberman warns
Former VP candidate calls on Trump administration to make biodefence a priority
The United States needs to sharpen its biodefence strategy to guard against the possibility of a global pandemic and the potential of a terrorist attack using a virus, Joe Lieberman , a former long-time U.S. senator, told CNBC.
“Two things keep me up. One is that a group like ISIS will develop a synthetic form of the flu, a powerful flu, and move it into our population,” said the 2000 Democratic vice presidential candidate. “The second, which is probably the more likely, [with] similar effect, is that there be an infectious disease pandemic.”
The latter concern about a pandemic hits home for Lieberman.
“In 1918, there was a global flu ... pandemic that killed 50 million people. I must say that my father’s mother was killed in her 20s,” he said. This type of event could kill more people than nuclear war and “change history.”
Lieberman, a Democrat turned independent from Connecticut, co-chairs with the first U.S. Homeland Security secretary, Tom Ridge, the bipartisan Blue Ribbon Study Panel on Biodefence, which put out its original report on gaps in strategy and recommended changes in October 2015.
Appearing with Lieberman on “Squawk Box,” Ridge said the estimated US$6 billion per year devoted to biodefence measures could be smarter spent with a more cohesive strategy that aligns the efforts of all federal departments under the auspices of the vice president.
