Given this, I agree that we are not in an emergency phase in the U.S. An emergency declaration was appropriate when we had rational hope that transmission could be interrupted on a population level and when we needed extreme measures to prevent collapse of healthcare systems. We are past this. Continuing the emergency would not be constructive given public sentiment and lack of funding anyway. As one epidemiologist told me, “If it’s always an emergency, nothing’s an emergency.”
Are we still in a COVID-19 emergency?
I’m not smart enough to have an informed opinion about the end of the COVID emergency in the US, but Katelyn Jetelina is… and she thinks it is appropriate. That makes me feel better, though the rest of her newsletter makes me feel worse about society’s reaction to this sort of emergency.
Anyway, you should subscribe to her “Your Local Epidemiologist” newsletter.