We simulate all sorts of plausible scenarios. They're only valuable if the scenarios are realistic enough to be applied to potential real-world stuff.

The risk of a pandemic was clear enough that https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Contagion_(2011_film) got made about the same time. It ticked pretty much all the boxes - China as origin, people thinking it's a bioweapon, contact tracing, politicians reluctant to take quarantine measures, panic buying, unrest, bat-borne virus, conspiracy theorists and antivaxxers, etc.

It's a hell of a movie to watch in 2021.