The virus has no idea what's beneficial to it. A virus that infects you for two weeks and which can pass itself on to two other people in that time is going to

The virus has no idea what's beneficial to it. A virus that infects you for two weeks and which can pass itself on to two other people in that time is going to infect fewer people than a virus that kills you after two weeks but can pass itself on to four other people in that time. Once enough people start dying then the numbers start changing (if everyone around you is already dead, you're not going to infect anyone else), but the virus doesn't know that. So no, COVID isn't out to kill us senseless. But nor is it out to maximise the length of time it can persist in the population. It's RNA. It's not out to do anything. It has no ability to learn. It has no awareness of the fact that it's in a host, let alone any preferences about what happens to that host. Don't anthropomorphise it.