Four years after that surreal, world-altering spring of 2020, almost everything has gone back to normal. On the surface, anyway. Restaurants and subways are packed, schools and offices are open, few people are masking, and the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention has dropped its isolation guidelines.
But
there is still a pandemic, and nearly 1,000 people are still dying from COVID-19 weekly in the United States, according to data from the World Health Organization
via KFF.
At least 17.5 million adults are currently living with long COVID, according to the most recent
Household Census Pulse Survey.
And there are new studies coming out all the time about the long-term damage even a
mild infection can do to the body.
For those still trying to actively avoid getting COVID-19, like Forest McDonald, a musician and teacher in Brooklyn, New York, it’s getting increasingly difficult, and expensive.
At 34, McDonald is already living with long COVID, from their first and only known infection, two years ago.
“It started with really intense fatigue, where I couldn’t walk a block without needing to lie down,” they said. “Then it turned into chest pain and heart palpitations, and then it settled with kind of a constant shortness of breath.”
