In January of this year, we wrote . In it, we predicted the World Health Organization (WHO) would declare the PHEIC over by mid-year. Well, , a week ahead of the anticipated end to the Public Health Emergency declaration for the United States. Of course, .
The 2009 influenza pandemic was declared over in August 2010 after data from worldwide surveillance systems showed the virus had become seasonal, just like other influenzas. As of the 2022-2023 influenza season, . As a result, the virus became predictable, and appropriate countermeasures could be deployed in anticipation of the next flu season. We were also lucky to have influenza vaccines that were safe and effective, and generally well-accepted, as they were not considered “experimental” or “too new,” as many people have said of the mRNA vaccines against COVID.
Epidemiologically speaking, a pandemic occurs when a disease or condition exceeds the expected rates for a group of people, a geographic area, or a time period; and the excess occurs simultaneously in different continents around the planet. For example, we have seasonal epidemics of influenza, where the levels of influenza exceed the non-flu-season levels. But this is expected in the winter of the northern and southern hemispheres.
If an epidemic level of influenza was to happen in the summer of either hemisphere, and the rates of influenza were high in different continents simultaneously, we would be in a pandemic situation. (This is what happened in 2009.) As long as there are excess cases and deaths from COVID-19 in different continents simultaneously, the pandemic will continue, epidemiologically speaking. On the other hand, if COVID-19 starts behaving like most seasonal respiratory viruses, then the pandemic will cease. (Again, this is all epidemiologically speaking.)
Going back to the 1918 influenza pandemic (before antibiotics, vaccines, or accurate diagnostic tests), that influenza pandemic affected the world’s population with . The has been ongoing since 1961. The HIV/AIDS pandemic has not left us since the 1970s (). That is, the actions we take to mitigate the effects of a pandemic depend on more than the epidemiological definition of a pandemic. While there is an epidemiological definition of a pandemic, the operational definition can be different.
Now that , the rate of deaths will likely decrease. Almost all local governments have lifted pandemic restrictions, and the interruptions in services and supply lines have stabilized. Based on these findings, the United States government is set to end the public health emergency on May 11, 2023. All of this signals the continuation of a “recovery phase” of the pandemic, and a more agreed upon “post-pandemic phase.” However, it is yet to be determined if COVID-19 behaves seasonally.
Thank you for reading! If you like what we researched for you and presented in this blog post, and would like to read more blog posts like this, please consider signing up for email updates by