Has the COVID-19 pandemic ended or not? opinions from the public in the U.S

Abstract

Recently President Joe Biden announced the end to the COVID-19 pandemic in the US but some scientists expressed different opinions. This study aimed to examine the view of the end of the COVID-19 pandemic among the public. Data were collected in September 2022 from an online crowdsourcing platform, and respondents answered if they believed that the pandemic has ended in the United States or not. Logistic regressions were used to estimate the likelihood of agreeing on the end of the pandemic, adjusted by demographics and several related variables. Among 2983 respondents, 78.1% believed that the COVID-19 pandemic had ended, and the percentage decreased to 66.5% after adding weights. Males, younger adults, Hispanics, those with higher levels of educational attainment, those with middle levels of household income, those living in suburban or rural areas, and those living in states that voted for the Republican party in the 2020 Presidential Election were more likely to believe that the pandemic had ended, compared with their counterparts. With about one-third of Americans did not agree that the pandemic had ended and marked demographical and geographical differences, the timing and the way of the pandemic end announcement should be deliberately cautious.