Have you noticed the change? After dominating the news and public discourse on a daily basis for much of the past 30 months, COVID-19 now is largely an afterthought.
Rare are the stories about emerging variants or debates over masks and vaccines. Scarce are the updated counts of infections and deaths. This change represents not so much a diminishing impact of the virus, but rather a change in public perception.
COVID-19 is here to stay, and we are learning to live with that fact.
That change is reflected in a recent announcement from federal health officials, who said that future recommendations will include an annual vaccination to ward off the disease instead of intermittent booster shots.
“This week marks an important shift in our fight against the virus,” said Dr. Ashish Jha, head of the White House COVID Response Team. “It marks our ability to make COVID vaccines a more routine part of our lives as we continue to drive down serious illness and deaths and protect Americans heading into the fall and winter.”
As Dr. Gregory Poland of the Mayo Clinic told CNN: “Our great-great-grandchildren will be getting coronavirus vaccines. Just like you and I, when we get our flu vaccine this fall, one of the components we’ll get is derived from the 1918 pandemic influenza virus, and 100-plus years later, we’re still immunizing against it.”
The difference, of course, is that coronavirus is a bigger threat than the flu. The virus has contributed to more than 1 million deaths in the United States, and the latest national counts show about 500,000 newly reported infections each week. In Washington, more than 1.7 million cases have been reported since the outbreak of the disease in March 2020.
With many people now using at-home tests or isolating rather than seeking professional medical attention, those numbers likely underestimate the infection rate.
As Americans learn to live with COVID, Gov. Jay Inslee finally rescinded, effective Oct. 31, the emergency orders he issued, beginning more than 900 days ago.
Quick, decisive action was warranted at the time, with the public facing a previously unknown disease, and Washington’s rates of infections and deaths consistently have been among the lowest in the nation. But residents are better informed now and better equipped to make personal decisions, so lifting the emergency orders is the correct, if overdue, step.
Yet regardless of Inslee’s approach in leading the state’s COVID response, the pressing issue is the response of the public and the federal government.
Despite some backlash — and falsehoods — about COVID vaccines, the shots have proven to be safe and effective. They also have proven to be the best method for slowing the spread of the disease. Without the development of vaccines, it is impossible to imagine the return to relative normalcy that Americans have enjoyed over the past several months.
That can change as fall and winter approach, with people spending more time indoors in close quarters, leading to more susceptibility. It also can change if a new variant of COVID emerges, one that might be virulent against vaccines.
The prospect of annual shots to protect against the disease will lead to small yearly changes in the vaccine formula, much as flu shots are now developed.
The goal, some 2½ years into the pandemic is no longer to eliminate COVID-19; that seems impossible. Instead, it is to prevent COVID from again being a headline at the top of the daily news.
