I agree with you there. I think a major factor why some have been pushing the engineered virus/lab leak scenarios is to use it as a political tool to blame China. That's not to say China is blameless at this point. But to jump on the lab leak or engineered virus at this stage of the game, and ignore the very real possibility this virus naturally jumped species just like MERS and SARS-CoV-1 is really putting the cart before the horse. Show me the bona fide evidence of engineering or a lab leak, sure, let's discuss the political ramifications. But people are wanting to assume these theories, not based on science or legitimate rationales behind, but on what they want to believe. Its no different than JFK's magic bullet.
There's one possible political consequence that is incredibly worrisome. Let's assume the virus did escape a lab by complete accident. With the rise of anti-intellectualism across the world, the pushback is not going to be just. Absolutely, labs should be scrutinized, and its possible given China, there were serious protocol breeches, or corners cut. But we all have to think about the other side of the coin. BSL3 and BSL 4 labs have been running in the US and Europe for quite some time. When was the last time you heard about a laboratory worker or somebody in their near circle becoming infected with Ebola that escaped the lab? SARS-CoV-1? Nipah? Eastern Equine Encephalitis? West Nile? Hantavirus? Scientists in places like the US and Europe have studied these badass pathogens without any(?) or very few incidents.
There's inherent risk to studying nasty pathogens. But if we didn't have 20 years of SARS/MERS research, could we have really built a 95% effective vaccine in under a year? Would we have been able to develop Remdesivir in time? But there's going to whackjobs like Ran Paul and other anti-intellectuals and anti-science who is going to throw science under the bus. So the world will be saved by vaccines enabled by science, but then the anti-science numbskulls are going to do some serious damage to society's progress.