I wonder if, as a side effect of near-universal social-distancing, we will end up eliminating any other contagious viruses, such as flu strains. Or instead, will the new selective pressure cause more widespread mutations of these viruses?
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The thing is, COVID-19 is such a huge problem for its combination of three reasons: it's highly contagious, whilst not being debilitating, except when it is extremely debilitating.
If a disease is *too* debilitating, it loses it's ability to spread because its hosts can't carry on their day-to-day routine. That's what makes the common cold so "successful". But it's the high-variability in symptoms that makes COVID-19 so dangerous.
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Well, that's not quite everything though. Even in fatal cases, the individual was contagious and asymptomatic for quite a long period. That's arguably even worse than the variability.
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Agreed, but the fatal cases are the minority, so it doesn't have much of an effect on its overall ability to spread. Take the fatal cases away, and we would still have almost as many people infected.
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