I will stand by the meme characterization. The first links assumes Covid was zoonotic which is a fine assumption but not a high quality conclusion and the secon

I will stand by the meme characterization. The first links assumes Covid was zoonotic which is a fine assumption but not a high quality conclusion and the second link shows the trend peaking in the 80s and then decreasing. Since the world population was only 60% what it is today, that is strong evidence that at absolute minimum the relationship is nonlinear and perhaps inverts at higher population sizes (as wild biodiversity decreases). To be quite honest, citing research on a politically polarized topic is not as useful as it used to be. The political polarization within the academy means that there is a lot of pretty loose research that may get through if it has the appropriate orientation. In practice, you can almost always find (low quality) research supporting one’s position if the position is lefty.