I can't see humans even attempting to eradicate all potentially virus-carrying creatures. Every creature can give humans some kind of disease. People got the human version of mad cow disease from eating cow brains, cats are dangerous to pregnant women, birds carry avian flu, etc. It's not just bats and bushmeat.
I definitely do agree that our interconnected lives and the ability to fly around the world has put humankind in a position to encroach on animals that are outside of our natural environments. And I agree with
@CharlestonGal that our modern lifestyle has brought together, in markets and zoos, species that live on different continents and would never normally interact. In the days of the explorers, animals from different lands were transported by ship to foreign continents, but not to the degree that we have now.
However, humans used to have a much more intimate connection with animals in the flesh that we no longer have. We buy our food in supermarkets instead of hunting and slaughtering these animals ourselves. People all through history have died of many a virus or bacterial infection from animals, like the Black Death stemming from fleas on shipboard rats. They didn't know about germs and the microscopic world and certainly didn't have vaccines or refrigeration in older times. But others diseases were localized to each community. Even among hunter-gatherers and other nomads, they weren't flying to other continents.
Still very disheartening. The Spanish Flu traveled worldwide due to soldiers in World War I, and they didn't have vaccines as we do, so we hoped to have conquered Covid by now. Here in NYC things are shutting down again, and even though I'm triple-vaxed, it's really a mental and emotional challenge to be still going through this.
MOO
