Exactly, Covid is a variant of a pretty well known class of virusses. The research on mRNA vaccines was pretty advanced as far as I gathered but testing them in trials isn’t something you can easily do. There’s a lot of hoops to jump through to justify trials with human subjects. When the burden of disease isn’t very impactful it’s hard to justify trials. Once covid came screeching around the corner suddenly the justification was easy to argue.
It would block it all the same if they parked in the spot. Assuming this person is handicapped themselves they must’ve figured “either I block the entire parking spot for everybody, or I block it only for those that need the loading bay area for a wheelchair lift.”
I honestly think it’s meant to be courteous and it does work out that way for some if this person’s only alternative is to take up the whole space.