COVID Over? Wha?

President Biden announced last week that the COVID public emergency, declared in March 2020, will end on May 11 of this year - for the record, a Thursday.  How can he be so sure we won't need a public emergency after that?  He can't.  He's even admitted as much, indicating that he reserves the right to extend it, in case, for example, another variant (I don't mean a German station wagon) arrives in America and deserves an as-yet unused Greek letter.

And even if that doesn't happen, the end of the emergency on the Thursday before Mother's Day weekend doesn't mean that people visiting their mothers no longer have to wear face coverings or practice social distancing, especially if their mothers are 65 and over, nor does it mean you can take Mom out to brunch without fear.  It means that vaccines (below) will be exorbitantly expensive for anyone who doesn't have medical insurance, and even in Obamacare-era America, many people remain uninsured.

It also means that treatments will suddenly be costly, as well.  For the country to move on from the COVID emergency without regret, one must assume that there is enough evidence to believe that the pandemic is approaching its end.

There isn't.  That's why the World Health Organization wouldn't declare the pandemic over last week.  It's also why so many people are still practicing COVID mitigation measures long after Washington and Democratic and Republican governors said we didn't have to.  Now, it may be so that there's enough COVID immunity in the world from vaccines and prior infections that COVID, like the flu and the common cold, will become benign and become a seasonal illness rather than an illness for all seasons.  But we won't know if that's so until spring, and it's worth noting that Delta hit in the summer.  A Pi strain from China could do the same this summer and get the protein-spiked ball rolling all over again.

Meanwhile, because of my own domestic circumstances, I have to continue wearing face coverings in indoor public spaces until the World Health Organization gives the "all clear" signal on COVID.  A friend of mine, who has taken up painting as a hobby since she retired, is having some of her paintings displayed in my local library, along with other local artists.  The reception was this past Saturday, and I planned to go.  I didn't.  Because even though everyone else likely would not have worn a face covering, I still would have had to, and even though refreshments are served at receptions, it's hard to eat and drink with a surgical mask on.  Take the food and drink outside?  Not in 20-degree weather, which we had last Saturday.  As fate would have it, my friend's paintings were already hung up in the library before the reception, so I got to seem them a couple of days beforehand.  No reason to go to a reception for an art exhibit on an extremely cold day when you've already seen it.   

While I remain cautiously optimistic that the pandemic wil lbe declared over soon, I'm not waiting patiently for that to happen.  The act of waiting for moments that never seem to come is over.  I'm not waiting for anything anymore, which is why I've postponed making plans indefinitely. And even when the pandemic is over, I know we're not going back to the way things were in 2015 - the last "normal" COVID-free year before Trump was elected President.