In 2017 and 2018 threat assessments, intelligence analysts even mentioned a close cousin of coronavirus by name, saying it had "pandemic potential."
The U.S. intelligence community has failed to anticipate some big developments, from the disintegration of the Soviet Union to the rapid rise of ISIS.
But the spies did forecast something like coronavirus.
For years, American intelligence agencies have been warning about the increasing risks of a global pandemic that could strain resources and damage the global economy, while observing that the frequency and diversity of global disease outbreaks has been rising.
In a worldwide threats assessment in 2018 and 2017, intelligence analysts even mentioned a close cousin of the current COVID-19 strain of coronavirus by name, saying it had "pandemic potential" if it were "to acquire efficient human-to-human transmissibility."
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Well that explains Trump’s cuts to the budget of the pandemic department. Trump doesn’t listen to his intelligence agencies. However, you didn’t need to be an intelligence expert to know that a pandemic was in the works. The longer we went without one the greater the chance one would happen. The last great pandemic was the Spanish flu in 1918.