The powers that be have taken to fomenting fear, in the hopes that they exercise dictatorial powers over a bunch of cowering sheep. From James Gorrie at The Epoch Times via zerohedge.com:
The medical, media, and political elites’ focus has shifted from facts to fomenting and magnifying fear.
In Franklin D. Roosevelt’s first inaugural address in 1933, the new president told a nation in the depths of the Great Depression that “the only thing we have to fear is fear itself.”
Those words were true and rightfully spoken at that time. Roosevelt knew that fear is a powerful emotion that limits our ability to reason, act wisely, and work together. It’s also an emotion that’s contagious and not easily diminished or dissipated.

The Power of Fear to Fragment Society
Unfortunately, Roosevelt’s words are even more applicable today.
On a personal level, decisions made under the emotional duress of fear are rarely the best ones and often the worst. Fear can bring out the best in us, but can often bring out the worst. That’s more likely to occur the more fragmented a society becomes. Fear among different groups of people creates an us-versus-them context in the minds of individuals, or even an “every-man-for-himself” attitude, which pits one group against another or even each of us against each other.