Question

Hello Rabbi, as the Rabbi probably knows, it was announced that tomorrow will be a day of fasting and prayers regarding the coronavirus issue, and my question is: to what extent does the Rabbi think this is really effective? (Obviously, it never hurts to say Psalms and fast a bit.) And on a somewhat broader level—I understand that a fast can be appropriate even if the epidemic did not come directly from the Holy One, blessed be He, in order for us to repent, but still, to what extent does the Rabbi see the coronavirus as heavenly intervention? Could it simply be a virus that is infecting the whole world without divine intervention? And if the Rabbi does not see this as something involving heavenly intervention, are there cases where we would say that there is something here with divine intent? In my innocence, I once thought that things on this scale presumably happen with providence alongside them…