Like many of these things, disentangling exactly what is what can be hard. If the media had ignored Y2K, I have no doubt that it would have been much worse as many companies, probably on the smaller end, weren't aware random bits of software was susceptible, weren't updated from vendors (who probably had little contact after the sale) about possible problems and updates, etc.

Sure, maybe IBM and Microsoft and the banks and Airlines would all be fine, but if a lot of small to mid-size accountancy firms all of a sudden couldn't process payroll for companies or deal with day-to-day needs of their clients, that could very quickly have gotten really had and had knock-on effects, and that's one industry.

The best case scenario for COVID-19 would have been everyone heeding the media and staying in for a few weeks early on and it petering out. Everyone would have said it was just a media fed panic then, but obviously, it's a bit more complicated in that case, because that didn't happen (or at least didn't happen enough for that outcome).

How the heck was Y2K a “media fed panic”? Media barely knew how to report tech at all, and barely knew how to explain what was at risk with Y2K. They mostly reported it as “might be a problem the clock is counting and we shall wait and see”.