The pandemic isn't over, but it's under control, experts say

New York Times map, adapted by The Rural Blog; for the interactive version and data, click here.

Last Sunday, CBS broadcast a "60 Minutes" interview with President Biden in which he said "The pandemic is over." It clearly wasn't in Central Appalachia and some other rural areas, and Biden administration officials spent much of last week trying to walk back and clarify the president's statement. Today, The New York Times' map showing new-case rates in the last week looks much the same, but experts tell Politifact and Kaiser Health News that the pandemic is under control.

Lou Jacobson and Jeff Cercoine of Politifact write for KHN, "PolitiFact has been tracking a campaign promise Biden made in 2020 that is closely related, but distinct, from what Biden told '60 Minutes.' During the presidential campaign, Biden said, 'I’m never going to raise the white flag and surrender. We’re going to beat this virus. We’re going to get it under control, I promise you.' Biden is on safer linguistic ground with his promise to get Covid 'under control' than saying 'the pandemic is over'."

Public-health experts debate whether it's over, "or whether it realistically can ever be," Jacobson and Cercone report. "There is no official arbiter for making that decision, and the word “over” suggests a finality that is not well suited for describing a pathogen that will exist in some form indefinitely. However, we found broad agreement among infectious-disease specialists that the pandemic by now is 'under control.' . . . Life for many Americans is much closer to the pre-pandemic norm, with virtually all schools open, concerts and restaurants well attended, and travel back to its typical level. . . . The level of U.S. deaths from Covid is lower today than it has been during most of the pandemic, and it has been that way since the spring. Notably, the number of 'excess deaths' is also down. That’s a metric that gauges how many more deaths are occurring beyond the long-term average for that time of year. . . . Hospitalization has held steady recently at some of the lowest rates of the pandemic. And even this level may overstate the virus’s impact; routine testing upon admission often detects cases that are asymptomatic and largely coincidental to the reason a patient is admitted."

But “under control” doesn’t mean minimal cost, say some experts, such as Babak Javid, an associate professor in the division of experimental medicine at the University of California, San Francisco: “The degree of protection afforded by the current vaccines available, especially to the most vulnerable, is of limited duration, and nonfatal outcomes from Covid can still have knock-on consequences to the population health.” That's called “long covid,” and it affects nearly one in five Americans who have had Covid-19.

"'Under control' suggests progress on keeping further spread within modest limits," Jacobson and Cercone conclude. "It does not mean that people haven’t lost loved ones or felt continuing effects from the virus; clearly, they have." And that's especially true in some rural places.