The risk has not gone away. What's gone away is our willingness to acknowledge it or do anything about it.
If you are letting fear of disease get in the way of living a healthy and fulfilling life today, that's an unhealthy trauma response.
This is demonstrably untrue.
We in the US are in the 13th covid wave since the pandemic started from tracking wastewater data which is our most accurate way of determining transmission (fortunately at a much smaller peak as of right now than most waves)[1]. The past four years have had far higher covid transmission rates on average than the two years we consider societally "when covid was happening". It does not strictly follow seasonal patterns like the flu, we routinely get summer waves that peak quite highly. The flu does not do this. Millions of Americans have ME/CFS like symptoms after covid, some extremely severe.[2]
[1]https://www.pmc19.com/ [2]https://academic.oup.com/ooim/article/6/1/iqaf010/8379704?lo...
...doesn't prevent transmission
> acquired immunity
...only lasts 6 months or so, wanes, and a new variant arrives
> the general drop in the number of effected people
Long COVID is severely underdiagnosed
> that's an unhealthy trauma response
The precautionary principle is a rational response, especially what we already know about the widespread systemic damage that repeat COVID infections cause.
The only reliable protection right now is consistent N95 usage in public spaces, and very few people are doing that (though some certainly are, as I see them every day).