Ending the Covid Public Health Emergency Isn’t All Good News

-19 Public Health Emergency, which has been maintained for more than three years, across two Presidential Administrations, will lapse on May 11th, bringing a symbolic and a regulatory end to a crisis that has claimed more than 1.1 million lives in the United States and disrupted nearly every aspect of American society.

The early-pandemic idea that a crisis that threatens everyone could unify the nation now appears quaint. The virus proved destructive for our health and our politics: by most accounts, the U.S. suffered the highestdeath rate among wealthy nations, and Americans are especially likely to believe that their country is more divided now than it was before the pandemic.

In March, 2020, as the coronavirus began to spread, Congress authorized enhanced benefits through the Supplemental Nutrition Assistance Program, which provides support to some forty million people. The following year, the share of households with kids who were food insecure fell to twelve per cent—a shockingly high number, perhaps, in the world’s richest country, but the lowest since we started keeping track, more than two decades ago.

Another reversal is just beginning. During the pandemic, states received additional federal funds for their Medicaid programs, and were generally prohibited from disenrolling people once they became eligible. As a result, millions secured stable health coverage, and the country’s over-all uninsured rate fell to eight per cent. But last month states were permitted to again start purging the rolls, launching what has been called the Great Unwinding.

We often view the pandemic’s turmoil as a failure of American governance and society. We couldn’t agree on masks, vaccines, social distancing, school closures, abstract goals, or concrete facts. These failures cost lives and livelihoods. Flip the lens, however, and another reality comes into focus: this was also a time when many people had access to food, shelter, and medical care with a consistency they’d never had before. After three years oflife, it’s natural to welcome a return to normal.

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