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You make good points, but while the "next one" may not require ventilators, it's a good bet that ventilators will be needed again. This is not the first respiratory disease pandemic.

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To quality as the next one, a disease would have to spread very easily from person to person. And that usually implies airborne. Which usually means it attacks the lungs, which usually needs ventilators.

Diseases that are differently transmitted like Herpes and AIDS can be widespread, but they’re unlikely to be the “next one” because they’re easier to contain.

Depending on how you define a nebulous concept like "the next one", HIV/AIDS already is since it's a pandemic

I think the "next one" means "shut down the world". HIV/AIDS is horrible, but doesn't need us to shut down the world.

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