The hospitalization rate and resulting panic could do it, though. Hospitalizations were about 20% of cases; worse, the rate dropped off less for young people than the death rate did, so while your chance of dying from COVID as a 30-40 year old was only about 1 in 2000, your chance of being hospitalized was about 1 in 30. Having 1 out every 30 people in the labor force hospitalized will shut down a lot of workplaces, particularly if their coworkers want to avoid the inconvenience (and $100K+ hospital bill).

I have an acquaintance that runs a box factory. Their COVID outbreak resulted in only one death, but it knocked one whole building out for about 2-3 weeks. Reportedly their competitors each had 3-4 such outbreaks.