"Someone Needs to Stop Playing Plague Inc."

 "Someone Needs to Stop Playing Plague Inc."

by:

Virgilio F. De leon Jr. MD

So, we have reports of pneumonic plague threats coming from Russia, chikungunya outbreaks in China, and Ebola outbreaks in the Democratic Republic of the Congo.

All I want to say is this: someone has been playing Plague Inc. a little too enthusiastically. They really need to stop now.

For those unfamiliar with the game, Plague Inc. challenges players to develop and spread a disease across the world until humanity struggles to contain it. It is an entertaining strategy game, at least when everything stays on your screen and nobody has to worry about catching anything.

Unfortunately, real life has a way of making even the most unsettling headlines feel a little too familiar.

There have been rumors and speculation about the pneumonic plague spreading beyond its reported quarantine zone in Russia. Given how quickly misinformation can circulate during an outbreak, it is difficult to separate legitimate concerns from sensational claims. Still, reports involving serious infectious diseases are bound to attract attention, especially in a world that has already experienced a global pandemic.

And after everything we went through in 2020, can anyone really blame people for being anxious?

Now, the plague is not a new disease, and effective antibiotics can treat plague infections when administered promptly. But pneumonic plague is a serious illness, and the possibility of an outbreak demands careful monitoring, transparent reporting, and a swift public-health response.

The more alarming claims involve speculation about a potentially weaponized strain escaping containment and spreading in the wild. If such claims were ever substantiated, the implications would be serious. A disease spreading beyond a controlled environment, particularly one capable of causing severe illness, would present a significant challenge to public-health authorities.

But that is an important distinction: the possibility of something happening is not proof that it has happened. We need credible evidence, not rumors, before concluding that a dangerous strain has escaped or that an outbreak is out of control.

Even so, the question is difficult to avoid: could we find ourselves facing another global shutdown like the one we experienced in 2020?

Honestly, I do not want to go back to those days.

I remember the isolation, the uncertainty, and the way an invisible threat changed nearly every aspect of daily life. We learned to stay apart from people we cared about, to worry about ordinary errands, and to wonder whether the world would ever return to normal.

I have no desire to experience a sequel.

And yet, when reports of dangerous infectious diseases begin circulating, it is understandable to wonder whether the world is prepared to respond before a localized outbreak becomes a much larger problem. International travel makes rapid communication and coordinated public-health action especially important. Borders alone are not a guarantee against disease, but neither does their remaining open automatically mean that an outbreak is out of control.

What we need is reliable information, effective surveillance, and decisive action when the evidence warrants it. We also need to resist the temptation to treat every alarming headline as confirmation of the worst possible scenario.

That is easier said than done, of course. Fear travels quickly, and rumors can spread even faster.

So, to whoever is supposedly sitting at a computer somewhere, gleefully unlocking new diseases in Plague Inc., I have a small request.

Please stop playing. Save your progress, shut down the computer, and find another hobby.

Some of us have already lived through one pandemic. We really do not need another expansion pack.