So what comes after Omicron variant?

We are now in Covid limbo. Cases are down and still falling, yet scientists aren’t willing to declare the pandemic over — or, conversely, to predict when the next wave might come. But perhaps it’s a good thing that public health officials are displaying a little less confidence. Researchers don’t really know why pandemic waves rise or fall, so it would be disingenuous to pretend otherwise. And less posturing by public health officials would be a welcome change.
Two years ago, scientists knew almost nothing about the new virus. Nonetheless, many conveyed an exaggerated level of certainty about virus mitigation efforts. That has motivated some people to follow their advice, but the cost in public trust has been high.
In early 2020, public health officials said that masks weren’t necessary. Later, they told the public to mask up, creating a debate that still rages. In 2021, they promised that vaccines would end the pandemic through herd immunity. When the pandemic didn’t end, many skeptics who resisted vaccination felt justified. And now, in 2022, they are assuring us that high-risk people can rely on one-way masking with an N95 mask, while the rest of us can go without — leaving some, especially kids, baffled about how best to avoid a deadly disease that’s still very much around. The result has been confusion and polarisation.
The desire to give people certainty is understandable. A message delivered with conviction is compelling. When public health officials started to endorse universal masking, saying it would save hundreds of thousands of lives, a lot of people listened. It might have been less compelling to tell us the truth: that it wasn’t clear what would come of requiring cloth masks, but it
might help a little. Nonetheless, that might have been better for building trust in the long run.

—Bloomberg