The pandemic will eventually end, even if omicron is complicating the question of when it will end. But it will not be like flipping a light switch: the world will have to learn to coexist with a virus that will never disappear.

The super-contagious omicron mutant is pushing cases to record highs and causing chaos as the exhausted world tries again to stop transmission. But this time, we are not starting from scratch.

Vaccines provide strong protection against serious diseases, even if they do not always prevent mild infections. Omicron does not seem to be as deadly as some early variants. Those who survive will receive some new protection against other forms of viruses that are still circulating-and perhaps the next mutant will appear.

Dr. Albert Ko, an infectious disease expert at the Yale School of Public Health, said that the latest variant warns about what will continue to happen “unless we really take the final outcome seriously.”

“Of course, COVID will always be with us,” Ko added. “We will never be able to eradicate or eradicate COVID, so we must determine our goals.”

At some point, the World Health Organization will determine when enough countries have adequately controlled their COVID-19 cases — or at least the number of hospitalizations and deaths — to officially declare the end of the pandemic. Exactly what this threshold is is unclear.

Even if this happens, some parts of the world will still be in trouble—especially low-income countries that lack adequate vaccines or treatments—while others are more likely to transition to what scientists call “endemic” states.

Stephen Kissler, an infectious disease expert at Harvard University’s Chen Zengxi School of Public Health, said the difference between them is blurry. He defined the epidemic period as reaching “some acceptable stable state” in response to COVID-19.

The omicron crisis shows that we have not yet reached that level, but “I do think we will reach the point where the SARS-CoV-2 pandemic is as pandemic as the flu,” he said.

In contrast, COVID-19 killed more than 800,000 Americans in two years, while influenza usually kills 12,000 to 52,000 people each year.

How many persistent COVID-19 illnesses and deaths the world will endure is largely a social issue, not a scientific issue.

“We will not go back to 2019,” said Dr. Amesh Adalia, a senior scholar at the Johns Hopkins University Health and Safety Center. “We have to make people think about risk tolerance.”

Not a modern healthcare subscriber? Register today.

Dr. Anthony Fauci, the top infectious disease expert in the United States, looks forward to controlling the virus in a way that “does not disrupt society and does not disrupt the economy.”

The United States has signaled that it is on any path that will become the new normal. The Biden administration stated that there are enough tools—vaccine boosters, new treatments, and masking—that can even respond to the omicron threat without shutting down the early stages of the pandemic. The Centers for Disease Control and Prevention has shortened the time that COVID-19 patients must stay in isolation to five days to avoid infecting others, and stated that it is clear that they are the most contagious in the early stages.

India provided a glimpse of keeping COVID-19 at a stable level. Until recently, the number of reported cases per day for six months has been below 10,000, but this is only after the “too traumatic to calculate” cost of life caused by the early delta variants, before the Christian Medical School Said Dr. T. Jacob John, Director of Virology. South India.

Omicron is now again contributing to the increase in cases, and the country will launch a vaccine booster for frontline workers in January. But John said that other endemic diseases such as flu and measles will break out regularly, and even after the omicron spreads, the coronavirus will continue to break out frequently.

Omicron has undergone such a huge mutation that it is getting rid of some protection from vaccination or previous infection. But Dr. William Moss of the Bloomberg School of Public Health at Johns Hopkins University predicts that “this virus will maximize its ability to make such a big evolutionary jump.” “I don’t think this is an endless cycle of new variants.”

Many experts see a possible future: in the post-pandemic period, the virus will cause some people to catch colds and cause others to develop more serious illnesses, depending on their overall health, vaccine status, and previous infections condition. Mutations will continue to exist and eventually may require frequent updates to better match the boosters of new variants.

But the human immune system will continue to get better at recognizing and fighting back. Ali Ellebedy, an immunologist at Washington University in St. Louis, discovered the amazing ability to hope that the body can remember bacteria it has seen before and build multiple layers of defense.

Memory B cells are one of them. These cells have survived in the bone marrow for many years, ready to act and produce more antibodies when needed. But first, these memory cells are trained in the immune system boot camp called the germinal center, learning to do more than just copying their original antibodies.

In a new study, Ellebedy’s team found that Pfizer’s vaccination can accelerate “T helper cells”, which act as training sergeants in these training camps and promote the production of more diverse and stronger antibodies. Even if the virus changes again, these antibodies may work.

Ellebedy said that the immunity of the baseline population has been greatly improved, and even if breakthrough infections inevitably continue to exist, the number of serious illnesses, hospitalizations and deaths will drop—regardless of the next variant.

“We are different from the population in December 2019,” he said. “The situation is different now.”

He said, imagine a wildfire in the forest after the drought. That is 2020. Now, even with omicron, “This is not completely dry land,” but it is sufficiently humid, “This makes it harder for the fire to spread.”

He foresaw that one day someone would be infected with the coronavirus and stay at home for two to three days. “Then you move on. Hope this will be the final outcome.”