The world teeters in collective anxiety in the midst of a pandemic. A novel and lethal plague spreads its tentacles around the earth. It ravages human populations and simultaneously undermines their interconnected economic and political systems. An elite group of political leaders gather to ask: What should be done in the face of a worldwide public health crisis?

This story line should sound familiar. But I am not summarising the news headlines about Covid-19. I am recalling the plot of a great work of literature. It is Mary Shelley's futuristic novel about a global plague, The Last Man (1826).