As we near the 2-year mark for the ongoing COVID-19 crisis, experts are offering predictions on how the situation might change going into 2022.
Dr. Anthony Fauci said in an interview with CNN that we could start having some control over the pandemic come spring, while Moderna’s CEO, Stéphane Bancel, thinks the pandemic could be over in a year.
And, according to recent mathematical modeling, the Delta variant is peaking, and cases should steadily decline through the winter.
Healthline asked experts to weigh in on how likely these predictions are, and what they think it will take to get past the COVID-19 pandemic.
Dr. David Hirschwerk, an infectious disease specialist with Northwell Health in Manhasset, New York, said while vaccination may be the way out of the pandemic, vaccine hesitancy, especially regarding children, makes him skeptical about the outcome.
“The more extensive our population is vaccinated, the better the control of COVID will be,” he said, adding that the pandemic may look different in a year, but he is “having trouble imagining that the virus will not remain in circulation.”
According to Hirschwerk, while there’s no argument that expanded vaccine uptake will lead to better COVID-19 control, vaccine hesitancy is a problem.
“This applies to adults who have not been vaccinated as well as their support to have their children vaccinated,” he said.
“I hope the models are correct, but there have been so many unforeseen surprises with this virus that I am not willing to make a prediction,” Hirschwerk said.
The COVID-19 Scenario Modeling Hub predicts pandemic deaths will fall below 100 per day by March 2022.
Dr. Louis Morledge, internist at Lenox Hill Hospital in New York, thinks new variants can “change things radically.”
“I’m not sure that’s feasible,” he said. “But I think if a superspreader is out there, for whatever reason, whether it’s natural mutation, whether it’s [something] vaccinated immunity can fight against, we’re going to be in a different circumstance.”
But Morledge also believes vaccination could be the deciding factor in reduced deaths.
“For the most part, what I’m seeing is people who are vaccinated, while there are breakthrough infections that occur from time to time, those tend to be very, very minor, tend to be without any need to access the next level of healthcare. People are not necessarily having to go to the emergency room, are not being hospitalized,” he said.
Morledge added that, provided we’re careful to get as many people as possible under the “vaccination umbrella,” life could be much easier 6 to 12 months from now.
Health officials and other experts have predicted that the pandemic will improve significantly by sometime next year.
Experts say that although some of these predictions may prove accurate, factors like the United States reopening too soon this year and vaccine hesitancy could delay progress.
They also say that the sooner we get everyone — adults and children — vaccinated, the more likely we’ll see improvement and get past the current crisis in the coming months.