I don't like Russell Brand. In fact, I'd go so far as to say I loathe the bastard and his liberal politics. But, just because most of what he says is shit, doesn't mean he is consistently always wrong.
His view on why the West refused to believe that the virus came from a Chinese lab a few miles from the source of the outbreak and instead told everyone it came from a bat several thousand miles away.
The tl;dr ... the West has a narrative that science will always provide the solutions. An inexorable drive for progress spurred on by corporate profits. But what if science was increasingly becoming the source of all our problems? What if science didn't provide the solutions to the pandemic, but instead increasingly caused them? Can pharma companies rely on government grants and handouts from a supportive tax base when those funds are used to hurt that self same set of tax payers?
I think this "science solves everything and answers all our prayers" narrative is particularly prevalent on these forums. The blind faith placed in these institutions by patrons of this site never ceases to amaze.