NEW GLOBAL PANDEMICS FEARED

Red Cross volunteers fight the flu pandemic, 1918.

DAVOS : Ebola, Zika, SARS a century after the 'Spanish flu' killed 50 million people, humanity now risks a new wave of  deadly diseases, and-

In today's globalized world another such pandemic may be unavoidable, experts warned at the Davos summit this week.

''Pandemics are becoming a real threat to humanity,'' Elhadj As Sy, secretary general of the  International Federation of  Red Cross and Red Crescent Societies, told AFP at the World Economic Forum in the Swiss Resort.

ONE Davos discussion titled : ''Are We Ready For the Next Pandemic?'' was joined by experts including Sylie Briand, a specialist in infectious diseases at the World Health Organization [WHO].

''We know that it is coming, but we have no way of stopping it,'' she said.

This year marks the centenary of the worst epidemic in history : the so called Spanish Flu -an outbreak that experts say was actually imported to Europe by troops from the United States coming to fight in WW1.

Across the world, the disease killed more people in two years than the four years of fighting had.

Richard Hatchett, director of the public-private Coalition for Epidemic Preparedness innovations [CEPI], said India lost five percent of its population in 1918-

The only time in the country's history that its population declined.

Agencies.