Who would have thought that this situation would continue for years? I certainly didn't back in March 2020 when life as I knew it disappeared and I first started this photo diary. Americans continue to be infected. The highly contagious Delta Variant of COVID has taken over the USA. American lives continue to be lost to the pandemic. Possible even worse mutations of COVID-19 are a concern for all. Coronavirus precautions - vaccinations, masks and social distancing - have polarized people in the USA. You either believe in Science and try to "stay safe" from getting the virus & spreading it to others. Or else you don't believe in Science & have bought into some idea of an alternative reality that is enabling the virus.

In addition to being vaccinated, our personal "Safer-at-Home" life style remains in place for the Cold Weather Months. As long as the unvaccinated allow the virus to flourish, there is a risk to all.

After the unreal, deadly "Summer Surge" of the Delta variant, the USA finds itself in a very bad place. So many people still refuse to get vaccinated or to even wear a mask. When vaccinations became widely available in the USA, it was optimistically predicted (in the Spring of 2021) that by Summertime 2021, America would begin to see and feel the "end" of the pandemic in our country. In reality, late Summer was anything but problem free. With everything "open" again & high rates of willfully unvaccinated Americans, the highly contagious Delta variants instead ravaged the unvaccinated population. The virus also again spread to even the weakest of the vaccinated. That now leaves everyone wondering how bad things will become this Fall and Winter. America's economy may be open and people may be back to "pretending" life is again what it used to be. Even so, COVID still continues to rage on. By allowing themselves to be new hosts, the unvaccinated have enabled the virus. As more seasons pass, coronavirus continues to make Americans extremely ill and take lives. America leads the World in COVID-19 confirmed cases and deaths.

With hospital systems over stressed, Americans are needlessly dying. They are dying from both COVID; plus from other treatable illness. Those with other life threatening conditions (heart attacks, strokes, accidents, etc) are being turned away because hospitals are overly full of COVID patients. The unvaccinated have given the virus the perfect condition to thrive. We are at a very sad time in history.

Unlike for the first year of the pandemic, this gallery will not be a daily blog. The gallery contains the 7th & 8th Season (the 20th to 26th Month - YEAR #2) of COVID-19 from my POV awareness. This has gone on for far, far too long. Nevertheless, I am still keeping this gallery as a personal reminder of history lived in the USA. Hopefully, SOMEDAY the pandemic will be past history for all & no longer living history that we must now somehow survive.

UPDATE: January 2022: COVID infections have exploded. Hospitals are overwhelmed. Both Delta and Omicron are circulating. This all seems to be the "new normal". Just 63% of Americans have been vaccinated. Vaccination statistics drop to 43% where we live with no mask nor social distancing requirements. This has turned out to be a truly dismal Winter.

I feel less optimism in 2022 for the future than I did a year ago when new vaccines (that could have ended the pandemic) offered hope.