Some hiring freezes have actually continued even to today. I applied to one postdoctoral fellowship in the Bay Area in March 2020, and the organization still s

Some hiring freezes have actually continued even to today. I applied to one postdoctoral fellowship in the Bay Area in March 2020, and the organization still sends me a monthly update that they have suspended all hiring due to the pandemic and will resume hiring once the pandemic is over (as ill-defined as that may be). That's almost two years at this point. That is a lifetime for young scientists. I agree that decisions like these do effectively end the scientific careers of many young scientists, or at least push them out of science as a career choice. It's sad but true.