The COVID-19 pandemic is over.
No matter how one twists, convolutes or stretches the data like the arms of Plasticman, we are squarely in the endemic phase of this abrupt dislocation of our cultural identity and we should accept that and move on.
Once a month I punch the button for the hematology and oncology floor and take the rickety, residual burnt-oil smelling elevator ride to the place where my fellow travelers and I are perused, infused and confused about our future without any need for a COVID-19 test at all.
Dead men walking do not matter? Perhaps?
Meanwhile, and in the leitmotif of theatrical face-clamping over the waning virus, I am not allowed to take a PET scan, a colonoscopy or an ENT evaluation to treat my life-threatening condition until I have tested negative for this endemic virus.
This seems like a Shakespearian play looking for a worthy, complex antagonist.
If my treatment is subjugated by the last wisps of a waning virus, then I will have become my own antagonist in this theatrical play and all will be good.