This is also in contrast to what I learned about illnesses - basically that the more “evolutionary successful” ones are the ones that are less dangerous, and ki

This is also in contrast to what I learned about illnesses - basically that the more “evolutionary successful” ones are the ones that are less dangerous, and kill the victim slower - think HIV or herpes. Which, even logically, makes sense - it turns out that a mildly infectious alive person walking around is a better reproduction vector for the virus than a highly infectious dead person.