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| Winter chills by dbolan_wir |
During the ongoing SARS-CoV-2 pandemic, the last full week of the year is when I struggle the most as I naturally reflect on what happened and what may be coming. In 2020, a survey of the American Nurses Association—the largest such association in the United States—provided demoralizing results in regards to their “nurses’ knowledge of and attitude toward COVID-19 vaccine development.” Only 34% of their nurses said they would voluntarily vaccinate themselves against COVID-19. Around that time, similar polls with disheartening results for long-term care facility workers were also being reported. A few articles had already been written about how we have never been able to gain durable immunity against a coronavirus. Then, on December 30, 2020, a then-record 125,220 hospitalizations and 3,903 COVID-19 deaths had been reported in the United States. Meanwhile, on my Instagram feed, many of my friends and family members were outwardly pumped and looking forward to getting past 2020 but I thought, for what? This coronavirus pandemic wouldn’t magically end at the turning of the calendar. Instead of optimism for the year to come, all these pandemic-related metrics just made me downright depressed.
