“Humanity has but three great enemies: fever, famine and war; of these by far the greatest, by far the most terrible, is fever.”
For centuries, humans have faced the threat of infectious diseases. It is no surprise that many would be in favor of eradicating some of the horrible diseases that affect the global community. However, what are the implications for the ecological communities these pathogens are a part of? The ethics of planned extinction has become a relevant debate in the field of evolutionary biology and microbiology. The ability of pathogens such as multi-resistant bacteria and influenza to avoid extinction can be viewed through the robustness theory: they are easily spread through humans because of their ability to form a network of genotypes that share the same phenotype. The successful elimination of smallpox in developed countries has initiated a movement to eliminate other horrible pathogens as well; however, how should our information on the evolution of infectious diseases be used? And to what extent should the integrity of ecological communities be considered?
To gain perspective on this controversial topic, we inquired the opinions of students and professors:
While speaking with the Professor of Microbiology at Lafayette College, Dr. Laurie Caslake, we were able to learn how planned extinction is viewed in her field. She points to the fact that to this day, we have only successfully eliminated one infectious disease, smallpox, while made headway with a few others, such as polio and measles. During this same time, thousands of new diseases are formed with some developing because of human intervention, such as widespread antibiotic use. In the race against infectious diseases, we are losing. On the other hand, a current debate between microbiologists is what should be done about remaining stocks of smallpox. While some believe they should be subject to elimination in fear of their use for bioterrorism, others find that further research that requires the intact virus will shed light on the ability of the virus to modify the human immune response. Indeed, the debate on the fate of infectious diseases in the field of microbiology is unresolved.
Read more about the smallpox debate here.
In an interview with a current student, we gained an opinion on how a student felt about planned extinction and the ethics of it…
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