Why we need to start telling pandemic stories

It's time to talk about COVID, together

Forgetting COVID.
(Image credit: Illustrated | iStock)

This month marks two milestones in the COVID-19 pandemic. On March 13 it will be two years since then-President Donald Trump declared a state of emergency on account of the novel virus, the spread of which would shortly overwhelm my home city of New York, killing at its peak in April 2020 an average of 1,000 people per day. And sometime later this month, the country's total death toll from COVID should pass 1 million.

Neither of those notable moments will mark an end. Nonetheless, it is more and more common — and appropriately so, given the widespread availability of vaccines and, increasingly, novel and effective treatments — to hear people talk about the pandemic in the past tense. Hawaii will be the last state to end its mask mandate this month, and the overwhelming tenor of conversation now is about how to make sure the last vestiges of pandemic life don't linger like post-9/11 security theater.

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Noah Millman

Noah Millman is a screenwriter and filmmaker, a political columnist and a critic. From 2012 through 2017 he was a senior editor and featured blogger at The American Conservative. His work has also appeared in The New York Times Book Review, Politico, USA Today, The New Republic, The Weekly Standard, Foreign Policy, Modern Age, First Things, and the Jewish Review of Books, among other publications. Noah lives in Brooklyn with his wife and son.