Here we are in the month 21 of the COVID experience. For the most part, we have settled into a routine and adjusted to the “new normal”. It’s no longer strange to see people wearing masks over their noses and mouths in public and, at the same time, we assume those who aren’t doing so have been vaccinated against the virus or just don’t care about it. Of course there’s still a political or philosophical bent to any government or official policies related to the handling of the pandemic but, for my part, I don’t run into this issue very frequently. Although I and my family and most of the people I associate with have been vaccinated, I have friends who refuse to do so for a variety of reasons. None of them are crackpots so I still see them on a regular basis. Although I’ve been to see a couple movies in the theater and we’ve been out to restaurants several times, our forays into the public are fewer and further-between than they were in 2019.

With all this, I often ask myself “How much worse could this have been?” As of today, there have been 788,000 deaths attributed to COVID-19 in the United States. At this rate, we will see more than a million deaths by early 2022. I believe comparisons of the averages from the last several years shows a fairly large increase in “excess mortality” with each wave of the pandemic. I think this statistic helps to argue against anyone who would say that all deaths are no attributed to COVID.

I tend to think that without the “lockdowns”, remote education and work, mask requirements and vaccinations, these numbers would be higher.