The Ills of Pandemic 

Fatigue
As the U.S. crosses the one year mark of community
transmission of COVID-19, expert Caitlin Rivers says
it’s more important than ever to stay dedicated to
public health practices
BY SARALYN CRUICKSHANK | FEBRUARY 9, 2021

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This article originally appeared on The Hub.

This month, the nation will mark the grim anniversary of the first confirmed cases
of community spread of COVID-19 within the U.S. For nearly a year, the novel
coronavirus SARS-CoV-2 has disrupted American lives in ways previously
unexpected, and while vaccines have already reached millions of people, new
virus variants also risk upending the progress public health and medical officials
have made.

It’s all, frankly, exhausting. But pandemic fatigue is a social concern, because it
causes people to cut corners on public health measures, putting themselves and
others at risk.

“People are tired of making drastic changes to their everyday lives and forgoing
things that are important to them like visiting family and doing activities,” says
Caitlin Rivers, an assistant professor at the Johns Hopkins Bloomberg School of
Public Health and a senior scholar at the Center for Health Security. “At some
point, people slide a little bit in their devotion to public health measures.”
Rivers shared further insights into the phenomenon of pandemic fatigue and the
risk it poses to Americans.

What are the risks of pandemic fatigue?

What we don't want is for people to start to incorporate more risky behaviors
back into their lives before the public health conditions have improved. Right
now, things are improving a lot, and we want to maintain that course. We started
in mid-January at our all-time high of about 250,000 daily reported cases. Now
we're down below 150,000 daily reported cases, which is great, but we really
want to be down below a 100,000, below 50,000. And so we need to keep
pushing in that direction.

Are there mindsets or habits that reinforce pandemic

fatigue, such as believing that there will come a day where
things are instantly back to normal or misconceptions
about the effectiveness of vaccines?
I think that people want to keep themselves and their families safe. Right now,
everyone is hearing about all of the things that they can't do. It’s important for
people to also hear about things that are safe to do, to maintain options for
people, so they can incorporate things that are important to them, but in a
safe way.

Are there aspects of society that we should absolutely

prioritize returning to normal or getting things back up
and running?
The first that I would emphasize is schools. In many communities, children have
not been in a classroom since last March. And it's been really hard. It's been hard
on the kids. It's been hard on families. I do think that returning kids to the
classroom safely needs to be one of our top societal priorities.

Another one I would emphasize for prioritization is visitation policies for hospitals
and long-term care facilities, particularly in end of life situations. Sadly, many
people are dying alone without loved ones at the bedside. And that is completely
heartbreaking. Although it's understandable from an infection control perspective
why we need to protect staff, visitors and other patients by limiting visitation
policies, these are special cases. And so it would be nice to find a way forward to
relax that policy.
And are there any indications of how long we can
realistically expect to remain social distancing
and masking?
You know, those two particular things, distancing and masking, are relatively
easy to comply with and relatively cheap. And so I would propose that those will
be with us for a while yet. But there will be other things that we will be able to
reincorporate into our lives, because prevalence will fall as more people are
vaccinated. I can see a world where we would be able to have more gatherings
and more activities like sports and clubs in the summer. Those kinds of things
might be able to come back, but we'll still need to take some sensible precautions
like masks in order to make that possible.

Are there signs of hope in the current state of

the pandemic?
Two big things. First, incidence is falling. The number of daily reported cases has
come down a lot since mid-January and it's been a really encouraging trend. And
so I'd like to see that continue. The other big thing is the vaccines. We have two
authorized vaccines, probably at least one more on the way and that will be really
helpful for keeping people protected. There is one curve ball, however, that I'm
worried about, and that's the new variants that have emerged. That may throw us
another challenge.

If you could share one public health message with the

public, what would you say?
It’s been a long year, and I know that everyone is tired and really feeling the
weight of this difficult time. Things will get better. We are on a better course, but
it's up to us what happens next. And so we do need to continue to wear a mask,
social distance, avoid gatherings. It is those individual choices, when put
together, that will get us to a better place.

Caitlin Rivers, PhD, MPH, is a senior scholar at the Johns Hopkins Center for
Health Security.