In this whole elaborate ruse they have concocted (for the purpose of imposing a global authoritarian state) one of the bigger consequences is the cheapening of science. The trustworthiness of science is permanently tarnished in a lot of people's minds.
It's a striking sort of irony really. Modern science assumed its lofty position during the Enlightenment, and it earned cultural respect precisely because of its willingness to question what was to that point an obscurantist system where information came only from specially credentialed gatekeepers. At the time of the Enlightenment it was the clerics of the Church acting as the gatekeepers, but before them you had druids and shamans functioning in a similar capacity. All around the world cultures would develop this priestly caste who claimed a special sort of knowing, and therefore you must obey their dictates "or else" (the sun won't rise, the crops will fail, etc, etc).
By prostituting itself to political ambition, science has begun to resemble this special caste. This is particularly evident in the insistence that the debate is settled. The Great Oz has spoken, didn't you get the memo? Most troubling is the coordinated attacks against those who remain unconvinced that anything has been settled. I mean, it's functionally no different than accusations of heresy followed by a Grand Inquisition.
All the forces in play seem to be, at the most general level, a giant reassertion of feudalism.