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CDC State of the Pandemic -- a Five-Year Overview [1]
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Date: 2025-01-04
It’s been three months since my last pandemic update, and five years since the Covid-19 pandemic that started in Wuhan, China, burst upon an unprepared world. As can be seen in the above chart, the course of the pandemic underwent a profound change with the emergence of the Omicron variant toward the end of 2021.
While it was enormously more infectious than any of the other variants that had preceded it, it was also considerably less lethal. Combined with the new mRNA vaccines that were highly effective at reducing the mortality rate (even if they were much less successful in actually preventing new infections), this virtually guaranteed that the pandemic would transition from its earlier and more deadly acute phase to the fading echos of the current endemic phase in which it is now just one of many respiratory illnesses to deal with like RSV and the seasonal flu.
CDC Data Tracker 2022-24
Zeroing in on the past two years, note how each succeeding peak in the weekly death toll has been less than the year before — from over 21,000 at the height of Omicron to less than 4,000 a year later, barely 2,500 last year, and less than 1,400 thus far this year.
Interestingly, while these previous peaks all occurred in early January, our current peak this season was clear back at the end of August; and while new cases are starting to tick back up again rather belatedly, I doubt we will ever see another weekly death toll even approach, let alone exceed 1,000.
CDC Data Tracker past year
OTOH, while the Covid-19 pandemic now seems well and truly in our rear-view mirror (unless you’re unfortunate enough to still be suffering the lingering effects of Long Covid), we’ve suddenly got two new viruses to deal with that could each emerge as a potential pandemic in their own right over the next few months — H5N1 (Avian Flu) right here in the US, and HMPV (Human Metapneumovirus) in China — but more on them in a future diary if their threats merit further attention.
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