COVID - The End (Sorta)

This past Friday, World Health Organization Director-General Tedros Adhanom Ghebreyesus finally declared the international COVID emergency over after three years, three months, and five days.  The United States - which of course won the booby prize for the highest case and death count of any nation on this earth - ends its emergency on Thursday.

Of course, the rest of the world figured this out long ago.  But though COVID is no longer the threat it was when it had us mask up and lock down, Tedros is asking the world to remain vigilant because COVID is going to be with us until the end of time and it's going to take some time before it truly becomes no worse than influenza.  In fact, the latest strain, Arcturus (sounds like a car), can cause itchy red eyes not unlike springtime allergies.  So now we have to look out for the Arcturus variant (now that sounds like a car, particularly a German station wagon!) and cross our fingers that it doesn't start another massive wave. And Tedros has said that he would not "hesitate to convene another emergency committee should COVID-19 once again put our world in peril."

For now, at least, the COVID scare is over, and many of us are back to living our lives.  I'm not, really.  For reasons both related and unrelated to the pandemic, I continue to refrain from making plans and from getting involved in anything.  I once said that I saw myself going to Europe in 2023 with the assumption that the public health emergency would end by then; despite the end, I have no plans to go this year or any time after.  I just can't see it happening.  With a couple of visits to New York City - my first in four years - behind me, I have no plans to return any time soon, mainly because bus service in my area has been severely curtailed and there's noting in particular I want to see or do in the city.  And, as always, I no longer wish to get involved in any social or political causes, as I remain convinced that it's all a colossal waste of time.        

I'm still in a funk, mainly because I had to give up on my Volkswagen Golf 8 blog (we're never getting the base model in North America) and also because a Facebook friend unfriended me after over a decade and turned out not to be a true friend after all.  Add to that some personal problems I'd rather not go into here and you can understand why I'm now more, not less, reluctant to put my life back together in the aftermath of the pandemic.

Besides, if I withdraw more from public life, I can more easily avoid Arcturus.