Was COVID-19 a conspiracy?

Conspiracy theories tend to go viral on social media.  No surprise, then, that this would be so for COVID-19.  Support for the conspiracy theories comes, not from an evidence base, but mostly from people's instinct to think that the crisis created by the current pandemic is inexplicable. 

From the title, you might expect an exposure of a major conspiracy to either cover-up of manufacture the COVID-19 virus.  There is no need for such theories. 

The only conspiracy is that between our immune systems and the virus, and our trying to find a way to deal with the current crisis.   

A pandemic was expected at some time because it is like such viruses that they will mutate and find ways to bypass our defences.   It is a constant game between viral agents and our immune systems.  Each, as it were, biologically trying to outwit the other.  

So viral mutations are not rare.  A virus might also transfer across species through such variations, giving rise to new strains. 

There is no need for conspiracy theories to explain this.  Nor is it sensible to blame other countries or populations.  They can occur in any country.  It is globalisation that has enhanced the speed of their spread through the world's population.  That is no conspiracy, other than that we conspire to travel and to trade across the globe. 

A new pandemic was expected at some stage and anticipated that such epidemics might become more frequent.  

A pandemic is not unexpected, albeit the timing of one is unpredictable.  

Pandemic influenza had been classified by the Cabinet Office as the number one threat to the UK population, for the past decade or more.  So much so that Health Trusts were encouraged to put in place contingency planning. 

Such contingencies are well worth reading.    An example is the contingency plan for Somerset, which assumes rightly that, 

"Any new pandemic can be expected to have a significant effect on individual members of the population, the NHS and society at large."

Depending on the nature of the virus, the number of deaths could be considerable.   All this was expected from the modelling. 

The best conspiracy now is for us all to pull together and see off this particular attack. 

We need now to learn more lessons from this pandemic.  This is the first of this scale and severity.  We must learn and conspire to do better next time.  There will be a next time.