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How long will we realistically be dealing with COVID19. How long will we need to alter our lives as a result?
When COVID-19 transmission is near to elimination in a community or local population then it will be “safe” to open up society to conditions that resemble pre-pandemic times. Although COVID-19 transmission is significantly less that at the peak, there continues to be low level transmission but enough that it has not stopped. This continued transmission is what prevents us from returning to fully opened conditions. It may be only when effective vaccines are available and administered to the population that we will be able to fully open back up. In some countries, transmission has been stopped; this was in countries where the population was able to very closely observe physical distancing, universal masking, hand hygiene, ceasing of social gatherings, etc. So, it is possible if the entire society is compliant with the extreme public health measures. Unfortunately we are seeing a lot of resistance to these public health measures in the U.S. and so that is enough to allow for the virus to continue to be transmitted in the local population.
