Addendum for 2026 (aka Year 7 of the Covid Pandemic):
We’ve been collectively gaslit into thinking “the pandemic” is a closed chapter — something safely filed away in the past tense — and we should have moved on! But that’s not how viruses work, and it’s not how bodies work. What ended was widespread attention, not transmission, or risk, or impact.
In the first week of December 2025 alone, nearly 11,000 new cases were reported to the WHO. And that number almost certainly undercounts reality, because it excludes people who no longer test and data that never gets reported now that many governments have decided surveillance is optional. (If you stop measuring the problem, you can pretend it’s solved! Very convenient.)
An estimated 6–7% of adults worldwide are living with Long COVID; that’s roughly 336 million people. That isn’t a niche issue or a rounding error. We are still uncovering how COVID damages the body in subtle but lasting ways: cognitive changes, cardiovascular strain, lung injury, immune dysfunction, fatigue that doesn’t resolve. Many of these harms are microscopic, cumulative, and invisible. Until, one day, they aren’t.
And on top of the virus itself, there’s the added strain of watching how quickly so many people decided that protecting others was simply… optional. And one of the very last options they would choose.
We’re right back to sitting next to coworkers with wet, open-mouthed coughs. To people brushing off illness with “it’s just a cold” while sharing air, surfaces, and space. As if we didn’t all just learn (very clearly!) how efficiently germs spread. As if masking when sick, staying home when possible, improving ventilation, or even covering your mouth with your elbow were unreasonable asks instead of basic harm reduction.
That erosion of care takes a toll! It’s exhausting to be told you’re “overreacting” for still being cautious. It’s draining to be one of the few people still thinking about how their choices will affect immunocompromised friends, disabled folks, elders, kids, and even complete strangers. It hurts to realize how many people have chosen comfort and denial over community.
If you still don’t feel “back to normal,” that makes sense.
If your nervous system is still on high alert, that makes sense.
If you didn’t suddenly become chill, productive, or magically healed just because the news cycle moved on, that makes sense.
This was never downtime. This has been prolonged, collective stress layered with grief, uncertainty, and preventable harm. And we are still in it.
You are (still) not weak for being tired.
You are (still) not broken for still caring.
You are not failing for moving carefully in a world that decided to sprint past the lessons it learned.
Take the rest you need. Keep the boundaries you need. Caring is not a waste of energy, and neither are you.
