Up until thirty years ago, they were treatment free i.e. pre varroa. Why shouldn't beekeeping bee easy.
As for potential, I suspect it's still an extremely long way off in the way I want my bees to be but pre varroa the honey bee had Braula coeca, it lived on honey bees and honey bees just carried on regardless. So there is a precedence for mites being in colonies and not being detrimental to the colonies welfare.
There are several reports from across the planet of treatment free honey bees now but they all seem to be small, swarmy and aggressive colonies. Far from ideal
Let me never fall into the vulgar mistake of dreaming that I am persecuted whenever I am contradicted - Ralph Waldo Emerson