Nothing has been proven yet. Very little is known, actually very little. Some suspected cases, a virus name, initial warnings, cautious statements from the authorities. In the past, people would have said: wait and see. Today, that means: live ticker.
As soon as the word “Hantavirus” appears somewhere, France turns into a nervous waiting room of history. The news channels switch to disaster mode as if the apocalypse were already at the door. Experts are passed around hourly like monstrances of a secular religion of constant warnings. Politicians reassure so hectically that their reassurance alone causes panic. And on the internet, the great liturgy of distrust begins: some smell a cover-up, others dictatorship, and yet others foresee the downfall of civilization. All that is missing is the first self-proclaimed Telegram virologist with a webcam and world formula.
Covid has not only shaken France. Covid has reprogrammed France.
Since then, the republic lives in a peculiar mixture of readiness for fear and longing for control. Every new pathogen is no longer viewed medically but historically. The virus is no longer just a pathogen — it is a political state of emergency on standby. People no longer listen for symptoms but for signals from the state. Will the mask mandate return? Are there travel restrictions? Will there be counting, warning, control, regulation again?
It is a strange triumph of modernity: Never before has a society known so much about diseases — and never before has it been so vulnerable to collective panic at the same time.
Meanwhile, distrust spreads faster than any pathogen. The virus may be biological; the real epidemic is societal. It consists of suspicion, constant agitation, and the feeling that no one tells the truth anymore. The state seems suspicious when it warns. It seems suspicious when it does not warn. The media are seen as hysterical when they report — and as accomplices when they remain silent. The result is a grotesque spectacle of democratic nervousness.
And so it thrives splendidly, the most beautiful plant of our time: the conspiracy theory. It grows wherever trust is lacking and fear rules. It used to be the hobby of paranoid outsiders. Today it is a popular sport. Every new pathogen comes with its own parallel reality — ready made for social networks, political fringes, and the outrage industry.
Perhaps that is the real long-term consequence of Covid: Not the weakening of the lungs, but the weakening of societal composure. A republic that constantly expects the next state of emergency will eventually lose the ability for normality. And a democracy that only swings between panic and suspicion becomes brittle.
The pathogen may be small and under control. Distrust is already pandemic.