I’m not sure deadliness is orthogonal to reproducibility. You’re correct that the statement you provide is false, but I think I would defend a similar statement as follows:
1. Causing humans to get sick is very likely to make a virus less transmissible, as the host stops moving around as much, or dies. This generally happens in the short term, but if not then in the long term—for example, if a virus transmits solely through relatives touching the corpses of the dead, it may initially be more transmissible the more lethal it is, but once the human populations that maintain this custom have been replaced by those that don’t, then killing its victims rapidly will become a disadvantage.
2. The disadvantage for a virus in causing humans to have symptomatic illnesses in is in tension with the fact that to succeed, viruses need to make human cells stop doing what they’re supposed to do, and start reproducing the virus, which is by definition going to mean our bodies working less well.
3. All viruses face both of these evolutionary pressures. Together they mean that the deadliness of a viral disease in a human population isn’t random but, for a particular virus in a particular population, has an optimal level.
4. When we notice a virus starting to be transmitted between humans, and becoming endemic in the human population, we do so because that virus is more dangerous than all or nearly all other viruses currently in circulation. By virtue of the fact that we have noticed a virus, it is likely that on the “cause less/more sickness” axis it is further towards the “more sickness” end than is optimal.
5. So the new viruses that we are aware of tend to evolve to become less dangerous.
The most obvious weasel words in the above are “for a particular virus in a particular population”. Given that humans evolve, and human customs and immune systems change, in response to viruses, then it could well be the case that in general the effect of viral evolution is dwarfed by the effect of humans evolving, and human societies and immune systems changing, in reaction to the presence of the virus in humans. So viral evolution might not matter much. Even if it does, other evolutionary pressures on the virus, such as avoiding the human immune response, might be far greater than the pressure to become less dangerous to humans. But I would still expect to see new viruses that we are aware of tending to evolve to become less dangerous.
Think it misses the point a bit to say that the EU and UK don’t care enough to deploy their own troops in combat roles against Russia. Whether they care enough to do so isn’t relevant; Ukraine isn’t part of NATO, and Putin has threatened to use nuclear weapons if NATO troops support the Ukrainian army. So deployment of NATO troops was never on the cards. General assumption seems to be that Ukraine will lose the war relatively quickly.
Sanctions will only make a difference if they are significant enough to harm EU/UK/US as well as Russia. Not sure anyone knows how extensive they will be. A lot depends on German public opinion, I think, given that Germany’s close economic links with Russia would mean that Germany would bear a lot of the pain, and that it has previously been more pro-Russian than any other large country. I know nothing about German public opinion, though the website of Bild, Europe’s highest circulation newspaper, is interesting this morning.
If sanctions are too weak to make a difference, Putin will have won. He has said that he will keep on trying to recreate the Russian empire, which now includes several NATO states. Listening to what he has said he will do has been a pretty good guide to his actions in the past, so the assumption should be that he will continue to try to do what he has said he will try to do. Clear risk of nuclear war if Putin invades a NATO state.
If sanctions are meaningful, they’ll tank the Russian economy, but difficult to see how Putin can back down, or be removed from power. And he has control of a lot of nukes.
Either way, we are significantly (weasel word) closer to nuclear war than we were yesterday. As you say, this is the sort of news that matters.