Omicron means the pandemic is effectively over. Funny to say I know as cases seem to rise stratospherically by the day. Hospitals will be hurt for a while, for sure.

But with a variant that is milder and about as transmissible as measles, most everyone is going to get it, and then some broad-based immunity will be built up, even among the clownish anti-vaxxers. It’ll be a bit painful but it’ll be the effective end of the pandemic as a social event (except among the ever-panickers and lockdown lifers).

The panickers are gradually — very gradually — losing, and it’s beautiful to see. By spring, this will mostly be over except those unfortunately debilitated by long Covid. That’s a choice we made, but it is what happened. Pretending the end of the world is occurring won’t help with that even a little bit.