This is as close as we’re going to get to V-J Day for COVID.

Although, given Fauci’s track record, it probably means we’ll be battered by a terrible new variant in like a month.

Remember that time he said he thought we were in the bottom of the sixth inning with COVID? That was May 2021, or 300,000 deaths ago.

Which, actually … turns out to have been pretty accurate. Three hundred thousand deaths is about one-third of the total U.S. death toll.

Anyway, brighter days ahead. Maybe. Possibly.

Dr Anthony Fauci told the Financial Times he hoped there would be an end to all pandemic-related restrictions in the coming months including mandatory wearing of masks…

Fauci said: “As we get out of the full-blown pandemic phase of Covid-19, which we are certainly heading out of, these decisions will increasingly be made on a local level rather than centrally decided or mandated. There will also be more people making their own decisions on how they want to deal with the virus.”

Asked when restrictions might end, he said he hoped it would be “soon”, and agreed with the suggestion it was likely to happen this year. But he warned local health departments could reintroduce measures temporarily if outbreaks were detected in the community…

“There is no way we are going to eradicate this virus,” he said. “But I hope we are looking at a time when we have enough people vaccinated and enough people with protection from previous infection that the Covid restrictions will soon be a thing of the past.”

Does that mean school can now drop mask mandates for kids?

It does not:

Fauci: "There will come a time" when schools can end forced masking policies, "but we're not there yet." pic.twitter.com/2QeLBIB1Ey

— RNC Research (@RNCResearch) February 9, 2022

Does it at least mean states and cities can drop vaccine passport requirements? After all, in the era of an immune-escape variant like Omicron, there’s no great community benefit in requiring vaccination provided that the local ERs aren’t overwhelmed.

Gonna be a no on that too, it seems:

Fauci says proof-of-vaccination requirements for public settings "is one of the important ways to keep the indoor environment safe."

"I support it." pic.twitter.com/7xO0LdvSX9

— RNC Research (@RNCResearch) February 9, 2022

Daily average COVID deaths in the U.S. reached their highest point in a year a few days ago, but deaths are a lagging indicator. The experts like Leana Wen who are suddenly urging blue states to relax restrictions are watching the trends in cases and hospitalizations, which are down almost everywhere. All 50 states have fewer cases now than they did two weeks ago and all but five are seeing fewer hospitalizations. “Governors and local officials are seeing the sentiments of the people they’re serving. And public health has to meet people where they are,” Wen told the NYT yesterday, which is, er, not a sentiment that was commonly voiced by experts until recently. But even so: If we don’t lift COVID rules now, especially with warmer weather around the corner, then when?

On March 10, 2020, with the virus just beginning to take off in the U.S., Yascha Mounk published a piece titled “Cancel Everything” that called for social distancing as America’s only option to try to contain the explosive spread. Not quite two years later, he’s back with a piece titled “Open Everything.” If not now, asks Mounk, then when?

Our current attitude toward the unvaccinated makes little sense. Even as we heap scorn on the unvaccinated, we make sacrifices on their behalf. The unvaccinated are subject to immense pressure and moral indignation. Governments and private institutions are doing what they can to make their everyday lives difficult. A number of people, including anonymous commentators on Reddit and columnists at the Los Angeles Times, even engage in open schadenfreude when anti-vaxxers die from COVID. This is wrong. We owe every victim of this pandemic compassion, whatever risk they may have chosen to incur.

At the same time, the unvaccinated are, implicitly, the main justification for ongoing restrictions—in that the pro-restriction camp points to the persistently high death toll from COVID-19 and these deaths are heavily concentrated among the unvaccinated. That attitude is also wrong. We need not put our lives on hold for the indefinite future because others have decided to risk theirs. And since social restrictions are strictest in those parts of the country where most people are vaccinated, they are unlikely to help those who are most in need of protection. Wearing a mask in highly vaccinated New York does little to save an unmasked person in barely vaccinated Mississippi.

If the local hospital isn’t short of beds, the only argument for maintaining restrictions at this point is to try to protect the immunocompromised. But we don’t normally take their needs into account when planning social activities, expecting that they’ll take their own precautions to protect themselves. If we’ve finally arrived at a place where COVID is no worse than the flu for someone who’s boosted, there’s no reason not to behave as we would during a pre-pandemic flu season, right?

I’ll leave you with this bummer from Scott Gottlieb, who’s looking at the immunity data from Omicron and expecting it to be short-lived. Gottlieb’s a member of Pfizer’s board, though, and Pfizer has a financial interest in promoting vaccination as superior to natural immunity so bear that in mind.

The Covid immunity from omicron infection doesn't appear to be that durable, @ScottGottliebMD says. https://t.co/F7mQUmV0NY pic.twitter.com/lIVZbxCFp8

— CNBC (@CNBC) February 2, 2022