Books and movies have the uncanny ability to make eerie predictions about future catastrophes. The movie contagion follows the path of an epidemic that began with bats and pigs (“Was coronavirus outbreak predicted 40 years ago? A book says so,” Feb.18, Gulf Today).

The more recent eerie prediction comes from Dean Koontz novel of 1981 where he talks about a Chinese military lab which created a virus as part of its weapons programme. The knack of that novel to zero in on Wuhan is mind-blowing. I never knew about the existence of a place named Wuhan until the virus made it famous.

Conspiracy theorists will immediately call the novel coronavirus a man-made danger. They already are with their noses on the trail. That coupled with China’s secretive nature of handling the virus and not giving out information makes it more conspiratorial.

Come to think of it, perhaps it is a bio weapon that went wrong and out of control. When survivors describe the symptoms, they sound like a horror story. Anything is possible in this world.

Joyce D
By email