Yes, still an assumption. It's like saying evolution selects for intelligence, which would be silly because no, it doesn't, even if it happened for a couple of

Yes, still an assumption. It's like saying evolution selects for intelligence, which would be silly because no, it doesn't, even if it happened for a couple of species. If the virus transmits efficiently, having a high enough R0, it has no pressure to evolve to something milder. SARS-Cov-1 lacked the contagious pre-symptomatic period. Note how SARS-Cov-2 keeps going strong despite the worst restrictions we've seen in our lifetime.