You are arguing ethics, I am arguing motivation. Disaster strikes, some mitigation is put in place, but then it's a long time till the next one. Which means plenty of time for enterprising opportunists to redirect the resources somewhere else because nobody really cares while times are good.

There won't be any lessons learned because in 20 years there will be a more pressing need for something else, and slashing funds for pandemic prevention will be a quick way to win some votes. This pattern will never stop repeating because it can't.

> COVID-19 has had warnings of its level of spread for years with SARS, bird flus, etc.

To me this was all "boy who cried wolf" stuff. I certainly remember media fear porn about SARS, about the expected severity of the next upcoming flu season, etc. It never amounted to anything significant in reality.

But here we are with COVID-19. Each of those flus were slightly worse than the previous leading up to where we are now. It's not that the scientists/doctors were wrong to make the warnings. Similar in how NWS is not wrong to issue Severe Weather warnings as frequently as they do. All it takes is the one time to have had advance warning and to not use it.

We just lived through two timelines. SARS-CoV-1 in 2003, which was successfully controlled, and SARS-CoV-2 in 2020, which wasn't.

COVID has caused three million deaths and counting, with widespread disruption to society. How could you look at that and say the reaction in 2003 was overstated?

You skipped right over the avian and swine flu pandemics, which weren't controlled and evidently barely registered.

Also, the widespread disruption to society has virtually all been from the lockdowns, not the pandemic.