I think it would be over-exaggeration to think that there are millions of viruses ready to jump on us and bring us back to the 14th century. That would be looking over a ledge that isn't there.
Sentiment: NEGATIVE
If we can contain and monitor animal viruses at an earlier stage - when they're first entering human populations, preferably before they've had a chance to become human-adapted, certainly before they've had a chance to spread - we can head off pandemics altogether.
Some day we'll move into space and start ensuring the survival of our species beyond Earth, whether it happens in a hundred years or a thousand.
The world can now maintain an acute infection in a way that is unprecedented in the history of life on our planet.
Let us not let the world be defined by the destruction wrought by one virus, but illuminated by billions of hearts and minds working in unity.
Human beings are a wonderful virus in some ways.
What I'm suggesting to you is that this could be a renaissance. We may be on the cusp of a future which could provide a tremendous leap forward for humanity.
I don't think the human race will survive the next thousand years, unless we spread into space.
Look how far the human race has come in terms of air and space travel in the last hundred years. So in the next couple of thousand years, you've got to believe that we're going to be able to do all kinds of amazing things.
It would be wonderful if I could see the end of civilization during my lifetime.
I'm really convinced that our descendants a century or two from now will look back at us with the same pity that we have toward the people in the field of science two centuries ago.