> could we not create a version that was 100x more transmissible than omicron but completely benign? Cane toads in Australia aside ;)
You overestimate our abilities to make viruses that do what we want, let alone to make viruses that do what we want and won't evolve into viruses that do what we don't want after being released into the wild.
This is also basically saying "can't we make a transmissible vaccine", and as much as I like vaccine mandates, I think there would be significant ethical issues with that.
A bit of a sidebar this was basically the plot of The Last Ship. With infrastructure of the world crumbling how do you distribute immunity without the manufacturing infrastructure.
So yeah I'd put it in a 'last ditch Hail Mary to save the world' type of plan...
I feel like I recall at least one worm that somebody released that would infect servers, patch the vulnerability that it used to get in, infect other vulnerable servers, then delete itself.
You overestimate our abilities to make viruses that do what we want, let alone to make viruses that do what we want and won't evolve into viruses that do what we don't want after being released into the wild.
This is also basically saying "can't we make a transmissible vaccine", and as much as I like vaccine mandates, I think there would be significant ethical issues with that.