It took a couple years for the 1918 pandemic to sputter out. We didn't learn to live with it, our immune systems learned to fight it off, and it retreated from

It took a couple years for the 1918 pandemic to sputter out. We didn't learn to live with it, our immune systems learned to fight it off, and it retreated from being an acutely dangerous threat to being merely a chronic one. The cost was millions of lives, because it was the only option- there were no vaccines or antivirals. But we have both of those now. The steady-state for COVID-19 will hopefully look something like seasonal flu, but it will take time.