The Next Likely Global Pandemics Ranked – And How They Might Play Out
A few years after COVID-19, it can feel as if the world has moved on. Yet in labs, ministries of health, and emergency operations centers, one question keeps coming back: which pathogen is most likely to drive the next global pandemic, and what would that actually look like?
Recent risk assessments from health agencies and research groups highlight a familiar cast of viral families. Influenza and coronaviruses still sit at the top of the list, but they now share space with highly lethal henipaviruses, fast-spreading mosquito-borne infections, and a growing category known only as “Pathogen X.”
The tension is simple and brutal. The world cannot predict which specific virus will jump next, but it can choose whether to be ready when one does. The difference between a disruptive pandemic and a civilization-shaking one lies less in the virus itself and more in how quickly surveillance, vaccines, and public trust can be mobilized.
This piece walks through the leading pandemic candidates as scientists see them today, ranking them by a mix of likelihood and potential impact. It sketches how each scenario might unfold, from the first cluster to the global outcome, and looks at the political, economic, and social forces that would shape the response.
The story turns on whether governments treat “the next pandemic” as a concrete planning problem now, or as a vague future worry to be dealt with after the fact.
Key Points
Experts still place novel influenza viruses, especially H5 strains, at the top of the pandemic risk list because they spread through the air and face little existing immunity.
New coronaviruses – or a sharp evolutionary jump in the virus that causes COVID-19 – remain a close second, with high likelihood but uncertain severity.
Henipaviruses such as Nipah rank lower on likelihood but higher on potential lethality if they ever gain efficient human-to-human transmission.
Mosquito-borne viruses like dengue and chikungunya are already moving into new regions; their most realistic “pandemic” outcome is rolling, multi-continent surges rather than a single explosive wave.
“Pathogen X” is not one virus but a category: an unknown agent from one of several high-risk families that could emerge where surveillance is weakest.
The ultimate damage from any of these scenarios depends less on the microbe and more on speed: how quickly the world detects, shares data, rolls out vaccines, and maintains social trust.
Background
After COVID-19, global health agencies overhauled how they think about emerging threats. Instead of focusing on individual diseases, they now map entire virus families by their ability to jump from animals to humans, spread efficiently, and evade existing tools. The result is a ranked list of priority pathogen families with clear pandemic potential, updated in 2024 and refined through 2025.
Influenza remains near the top because it is already adapted to human respiratory transmission. New strains arise through gradual mutation or sudden “reassortment,” where gene segments mix in an animal host. The recent spread of H5N1 bird flu into dairy cattle, cats, and even isolated human cases shows how a primarily animal virus can test the boundaries of species jumps.
Coronaviruses earned their place on the list through three separate events in two decades: SARS, MERS, and COVID-19. They circulate widely in bats and other animals, they recombine easily, and they can evolve around immunity. Even as COVID-19’s direct health impact has fallen compared with 2020, global risk assessments still rate it as a high-level threat that could change character again.
Alongside them sit henipaviruses such as Nipah, which have caused repeated local outbreaks in South and Southeast Asia with very high fatality rates but limited onward spread. Mosquito-borne viruses like dengue and Zika, which thrive in warming climates and dense cities, are already pushing health systems to the limit in many tropical countries.
Against this backdrop, the term “Pathogen X” has moved from science fiction to planning tool. It stands for the next dangerous virus that has not yet been discovered, but almost certainly exists in wildlife, livestock, or even crowded urban environments.
Analysis
How scientists rank the next global pandemics
Novel pandemic influenza (especially H5 or reassorted H1/H3)
Most risk frameworks still put influenza first. It spreads efficiently through droplets and aerosols, can be contagious before symptoms, and has a long history of global pandemics. A future scenario could start with a bird-origin H5 virus that adapts in mammals such as pigs or cattle, picks up human-friendly traits, and suddenly moves through crowded markets or farms. The likely outcome: rapid global spread in months, with severity ranging from “bad seasonal flu plus” to a 1918-style shock, depending on how lethal the new strain is and how well vaccines work.New coronavirus (or a major shift in SARS-CoV-2)
The second-ranked threat is another coronavirus event. This could be a brand-new bat-derived virus, or a SARS-CoV-2 variant that combines immune escape with renewed severity. In either case, the most likely outcome is a COVID-like pandemic with familiar features: fast global spread, uneven severity by age and health status, and large pressures on hospitals and long-term illness. Better vaccines, antivirals, and baseline immunity would soften the blow, but public fatigue and political division could slow response.Henipavirus spillover (Nipah-like pathogen)
Henipaviruses sit lower on likelihood because they have not yet shown sustained human-to-human transmission. But if a Nipah-like virus ever acquired that ability while keeping anything like its current fatality rates, the consequences would be extreme. A plausible outcome is a series of explosive regional outbreaks, triggering travel restrictions and emergency vaccine programs, with the world racing to contain spread before it reaches every continent.Expanding mosquito-borne pandemics (dengue, chikungunya, Zika and others)
Mosquito-borne infections are unlikely to explode worldwide in a single synchronized wave the way COVID-19 did. Instead, their “pandemic” future looks more like a rolling storm season: overlapping outbreaks across the Americas, Africa, and parts of Europe and Asia as climate change, urbanization, and travel push vectors into new territories. The outcome is chronic strain on hospitals, rising disability, and persistent economic losses, especially in cities without robust vector control.Pathogen X from a high-risk family
Pathogen X is the joker in the deck. It could emerge from a known family like paramyxoviruses, orthomyxoviruses, or coronaviruses, or from a less studied group that current systems barely track. The likely outcome is a period of confusion: unusual clusters, uncertain lab results, and a dangerous lag before the world recognizes a new pandemic. How severe it becomes depends almost entirely on whether early detection, genomic sharing, and fast “prototype” vaccines are already in place when that moment comes.
Political and Geopolitical Dimensions
Pandemics are as much political events as biological ones. The first days of an outbreak determine who controls information, who gets blamed, and who gains or loses global influence. Countries that detect and share data quickly risk trade impacts, travel bans, and domestic backlash. Those that delay or downplay cases risk deadly spread and international isolation later.
Vaccine nationalism is another central fault line. In a future influenza or coronavirus pandemic, states with manufacturing capacity will face pressure to prioritize their own populations, even while global agencies argue for equitable distribution. Military planners also track pandemic scenarios because waves of illness can disrupt deployments, supply lines, and domestic stability.
In a henipavirus or Pathogen X scenario, there is a real risk that geopolitics could harden into blocs, with different regions backing competing narratives about origins, lab safety, and response strategies. That would slow the very data sharing needed to contain the threat.
Economic and Market Impact
Global markets have already had a live fire exercise in pandemic shock. Another major respiratory pandemic would likely trigger sharp, if shorter, hits to travel, hospitality, retail, and office-based work. Supply chains for medicines, semiconductors, and food would once again come under strain, especially if outbreaks hit key industrial regions.
A mosquito-driven pandemic era would look different. Instead of one big crash, there would be repeated regional disruptions: canceled tourist seasons, higher health insurance costs, new infrastructure spending on water, sanitation, and housing. Investors would price climate-sensitive disease risk into sovereign debt and real estate, especially in coastal cities.
For governments, the most immediate economic choice is whether to fund preparedness during calm years. Upfront spending on surveillance, stockpiles, and flexible vaccine platforms looks expensive until compared with the trillions lost in 2020–2021.
Social and Cultural Fallout
Socially, the next pandemic will not land on a blank slate. Populations are divided by their experiences during COVID-19: some demand never repeating strict lockdowns; others demand faster action next time. That split will shape how people respond to new guidance, especially if early information is uncertain.
Pandemics also reshape norms. Masks, home testing, and remote work, once fringe ideas, are now familiar tools. In a future event, communities might adapt faster, but they could also fracture more quickly along partisan or cultural lines. Misinformation will spread even faster than before, powered by optimized algorithms and synthetic media.
At the same time, shared crisis can also deepen solidarity. In cities already living with dengue or other vector-borne diseases, neighborhood-level action against standing water and mosquitoes is becoming part of daily life. The question is whether those habits scale globally or remain patchy.
Technological and Security Implications
On the technology side, the world is better placed than it was in 2019. mRNA and other rapid-response platforms mean that once a new virus is identified, prototype vaccines can be designed in weeks, not years. Genomic sequencing has become part of routine outbreak work in many countries.
But the same tools that enable rapid countermeasures also raise biosecurity concerns. Easy-to-use genetic engineering techniques increase the theoretical risk of accidental or deliberate release of altered pathogens. That is one reason Pathogen X planning includes both natural spillover and lab-linked scenarios, without presuming which is more likely.
Digital technology is also a double-edged sword. Early warning systems that mine clinical, travel, and even wastewater data can spot anomalies fast, but they raise privacy and governance questions. Contact tracing apps and health passes, if revived, would again sit at the intersection of health security and civil liberties.
What Most Coverage Misses
Most public debate focuses on the headline-grabbing virus – bird flu this month, a coronavirus variant the next. What often gets less attention is the underlying capacity gap: the chronic shortage of health workers, laboratory networks, and community-level trust that determines how any outbreak plays out.
Another neglected factor is the slow-burn threat of antimicrobial resistance. While it may not trigger a classic viral pandemic, it can turn moderate outbreaks into severe ones by making routine bacterial complications far harder to treat. In a future influenza or coronavirus pandemic, resistant infections could quietly drive a large share of deaths.
Finally, pandemic talk tends to focus on “global” outcomes, but the risk is not evenly distributed. Poorer countries, informal settlements, and conflict zones are more exposed to both infection and economic aftershocks. That unequal baseline shapes every scenario, from the first spillover event to the final recovery.
Why This Matters
The ranking of likely future pandemics is not an academic exercise. It determines which vaccines are developed in advance, which viruses are tracked most closely in animals, and where limited funds for hospital upgrades and data systems go.
In the short term, the main practical consequences are decisions on vaccine pipelines, stockpiles of antivirals and protective equipment, and cross-border data-sharing rules. Influenza and coronavirus preparedness still dominate those agendas, but henipavirus and Pathogen X planning is rising.
Over the longer term, these choices feed into broader trends: climate adaptation, food system reform, migration policy, and debates over digital surveillance. The same urban planning decisions that reduce heat stress and flooding can also cut mosquito-borne disease risk.
Events to watch include seasonal influenza and dengue peaks each year; periodic updates to global priority pathogen lists; funding decisions on vaccine and diagnostic platforms; and any unexplained clusters of severe disease that appear in healthcare or wastewater data.
Real-World Impact
A nurse in London sees the impact of a new influenza pandemic not in abstract graphs but in full wards, tighter staffing, and the emotional toll of deciding who gets scarce intensive care beds during peak weeks. Even with better treatments than in 2020, the experience would feel like a grim return.
A small hotel owner in southern Spain lives through a different version of the story in a mosquito-driven scenario. Repeated summer dengue outbreaks scare visitors away, insurance premiums rise, and local authorities impose new rules on water storage and construction, adding costs but also building resilience.
A market vendor in Lagos feels Pathogen X as uncertainty. Rumors spread faster than official statements, sales drop during each wave of fear, and access to clear, trusted information becomes as important as access to vaccines. Whether that person can keep working safely depends on local clinics, not global summits.
A mid-size manufacturer in Ohio sees another coronavirus pandemic through supply chains. Shipments of components slow, absenteeism rises, and managers must decide whether to invest in air filtration, flexible scheduling, and remote monitoring systems that could buffer future shocks.
Not if, But When?
The next global pandemic is unlikely to be a bolt from the blue. It will probably arise from virus families scientists already know and watch: influenza, coronaviruses, henipaviruses, or fast-moving mosquito-borne infections. The wildcard is Pathogen X, the as-yet-unnamed virus that slips through gaps in surveillance.
The core tension is not between specific bugs but between preparation and drift. On one path, countries invest now in early warning, flexible vaccines, strong local health systems, and honest communication. On the other, they let memories of COVID-19 fade and respond ad hoc when the next threat appears.
Which path the world is on will become clearer in small but telling signs: whether routine outbreaks trigger rapid, coordinated action; whether vaccine technology is shared widely; whether health workers are supported rather than burned out. Those signals, more than any single headline, will show whether the ranking of future pandemics remains a warning – or turns into a replay.
