Two years of pandemic living

Last year, at the one-year mark of the pandemic, I posted on March 12th about "'The Last Normal Day,' one year later."  At the very end, I wrote, "Things may never be quite "back to normal" again.  But I hope that things will be different (better) by March 12, 2022... " 

So -- here we are, one year later, and two years after the "official" declaration of a pandemic by the World Health Organization (on March 11, 2020). What's better now? What's not? 

What's good/better:  

• Vaccines!  When I read my post from this time last year (and some of the others from early/mid-2021), I'm reminded that vaccines were JUST beginning to roll out here in Canada then -- and of how HARD it was to wait until we could get ours too (and how hard it was to book those elusive appointments!). (Our first shots -- AstraZeneca -- were on April 5th, second (Moderna) on July 1st and third/boosters -- Pfizer -- on Dec. 16th.) There's no doubt the vaccines have made a huge difference, if not in the number of infections (particularly since the rise of the omicron variant in late 2021) then certainly in the numbers of people winding up in hospitals and in the ICUs on respirators. 
• Canada has one of the world's most-vaccinated populations (81.6% fully vaccinated).  
• For me personally, being fully vaccinated (plus the end of interprovincial travel restrictions) meant that we were (finally!) able to head "home" to Manitoba to see my parents and sister for (Canadian) Thanksgiving in October (and then again for Christmas), for the first time in almost two years, knowing it was much less likely that we could pass on the virus to them.
• It also meant that we could start seeing BIL & family, more safely, more often, AND spend more time with Little Great-Nephew (born in November 2019, just slightly pre-pandemic). He has been such a joy and such a welcome diversion, this past year especially!  Our visits with him are the highlight of every week.   
• Two years in, and so far (KNOCKING WOOD, VERY LOUDLY) dh & I remain healthy. 
• Of course, we are extremely privileged in many ways. We are both retired, so we don't have to go out to work every day. We don't have children or grandchildren (this makes us UNprivileged in some respects, but...), so we don't have to worry about trying to normalize the situation for them by letting them play with their friends and keeping up with friends' families and doing things we might not otherwise do. We don't have to worry about the germs they might pick up at school or extracurricular activities and pass on. We're both pretty happy (most of the time!) staying at home and reading a book. While we both like to get out of the house once in a while and socialize with people, we don't especially feel the NEED to do so (and certainly not in the middle of a pandemic...!). We have the financial and technical means to order takeout and have things delivered to our door, so we can minimize the number of shopping trips we need to make. And while we both enjoyed going to the movies and eating out in restaurants in the "before" times, we're not desperate enough to risk it yet (particularly without vaccine passports &/or capacity restrictions in place). We've been supporting some of our favourite restaurants by ordering takeout instead. 
• While people close to us have had covid (especially in late December/early January) -- including Older Nephew, his wife and (sadly) Little Great-Nephew -- nobody has been hospitalized with it, and nobody has died (again, knocking wood).
• We did go through extended periods of "lockdown," where most things were closed, other than supermarkets, pharmacies and takeout food services (followed by capacity restrictions that were gradually lifted in stages). As this story mentions, Ontario, where I live, has spent more time under "lockdown" than any other province or U.S. state, and students here have missed more in-person classes than anywhere in North America and most of Europe. (This BBC story is from May 2021, just before restrictions began to lift.)  But -- we've recorded fewer deaths per capita than other provinces and bordering U.S. states, including Quebec, Manitoba, New York and Michigan. And -- despite the very vocal complaints of some -- it's really been quite possible to live a pretty normal life over the past year -- go most places you would normally go and do most of the things you would normally do -- so long as you were vaccinated (and prepared to show your proof of vaccination at some venues) and/or wearing a mask. 
• The quality and supply of masks available to the general public, both in terms of comfort and effectiveness, has improved immensely. 
• In the early days of the pandemic, there was a real scramble to find masks. BIL provided dh with a couple of construction-grade N-95s that were uncomfortable and hard to breathe in, and I was cutting up old socks to make no-sew face coverings (with instructions I found online).  (I've still got some of those masks -- I wear them when I'm scrubbing the bathroom shower cubicle to minimize the fumes from the cleaning products I'm using, lol.)  Mask mandates will be lifting soon (whether they should be at this point is debatable...), but dh & I will be continuing to wear masks in crowded public venues (and certainly when flying -- the mandates will continue there for a while yet) for a while to come. Even when covid ceases to be the threat that it is now, there's still the flu and the common cold...!  
• By summer 2020, cheap and colourful cloth masks were being sold, and I bought a bunch online from Old Navy. They've been good (and we still wear them, especially for short trips down to the parking garage en route to visit BIL & SIL). 
• These days, plenty of N-95s or equivalents are available from a variety of sources, and they're quite comfortable and breathable, not to mention far more effective than cloth or medical masks. 
• Rapid tests FINALLY started becoming more widely available here in late 2021. Many schools and workplaces are providing them for free. 

What's (still) not so good:  

• Two years later, the numbers are staggering:  Worldwide, more than 450 million people have been sick with COVID-19;  more than 6 million have died.  In the U.S., there have been nearly 80 million cases and almost 1 million people people are dead.  In Canada:  3.3+ million cases, 37,000+ deaths.  Here in the province of Ontario, we've had 1.1+ million cases (likely a vast underestimate) and 12,000+ deaths;  the region near Toronto where dh & I live (population 1.2 million) has had more than 99,000 cases (again, that's probably a low count) and almost 1,000 deaths."  
• By comparison, here's what I wrote at this time last year:  "Worldwide, 118 million people have been sick with COVID-19;  2.6 million have died.  In the U.S., there have been 29 million cases and a staggering 530,000 people are dead.  Canada has fared better than a lot of other countries (especially on a per capita basis), but the numbers are still sobering:  900,000+ cases, 22,000+ deaths.  Here in the province of Ontario, we've had almost 320,000 cases and 7,100 deaths;  the region near Toronto where dh & I live (population 1.2 million) has had nearly 30,000 cases and more than 530 deaths."  
• The long-term effects of covid won't be known for quite a while, although there's growing evidence (and it's not good).  "Long covid" is a very real thing for many people. 
• There are plenty of other, more intangible costs revealing themselves: mental health issues, isolation and loneliness, families unable to see each other for long periods of time, families split over vaccination and masking, the disruption to children's education and social development, the incredible stress placed on frontline workers, particularly in medical roles and in education... 
• And -- it's not over yet. New case numbers, hospitalizations and deaths have been declining since the mid-January omicron peak, but still remain at levels that would have been thought unacceptable earlier in the pandemic. The BA2 variant (even more contagious than omicron) is becoming more prevalent; recent wastewater analysis has shown a slight uptick in viral load (just as Ontario is abandoning all restrictions, of course...!). 
• Unfortunately, too many people seem to think that it IS over, declaring they are "done" with covid -- including the politicians who -- with a provincial election coming up on June 2nd -- have lifted almost all remaining restrictions, while at the same time suppressing data. Capacity restrictions and vaccine passports were lifted on March 1st, and mask mandates in all but a few high-risk settings (hospitals, care homes, public transit) will be gone as of March 21st.  All mask mandates will be gone by April 27th. The legal requirement to self-isolate after a positive test? That's gone too. 
• The government has vastly restricted PCR testing, meaning the number of actual new cases is far higher than what's being officially reported. (The chief medical officer has admitted that new case numbers are likely TEN TIMES HIGHER than what's being reported -- i.e., 12,000 cases a day, not 1,200.)  Reporting on cases in schools is also limited. With most restrictions now lifted (or soon to be lifted), citizens are left to fend for themselves. How are we supposed to assess risk and make wise decisions in the almost complete absence of meaningful data?? 
• Although the struggles of parents (and mothers in particular) during this pandemic have been well documented, far less attention has been paid to those of us without children, partners, and/or extended family support around us, and how we've been coping -- or not. Dh & I have been fairly fortunate in this respect, but I know there are others out there who are lonely, isolated and struggling to get by, without a whole lot of help or acknowledgement. 
• As mentioned above, it's great that rapid tests are (finally!) more widely available and being distributed for free in many schools and workplaces.  Not so good: Since dh & I are neither employed nor have children or grandchildren, we've had to buy some. The provincial government did recently distribute some freebies in supermarkets, pharmacies, etc., and we did manage to snag a box of those -- but I haven't seen or heard of any being given out lately.  
• A new study released this week by the CBC and Angus Reid suggests that the pandemic has brought out the worst in people and pulled Canadians further apart. :(  
• While vaccines have clearly made a difference (certainly for me personally), there are still too many people -- particularly outside of wealthier nations -- who haven't yet been vaccinated or even had the opportunity to do so, because they simply don't have easy access to them yet. Until more people in more countries get vaccinated, this virus will continue to be a problem for all of us.  

What will year #3 bring? I guess we're about to find out...