Permanent for schools and healthcare workers. COVID should be added to the required public school vaccinations we're already doing and while we're at it, flu too. For the rest of us, until COVID numbers are under control and have stayed that way for a while. An Indian epidemiologist suggested three months without a surge, which seems reasonable.

I agree that barkeeps and the like shouldn't be having to enforce this forever. But we aren't at the point where we can ease off yet. And as pointed out...NYC is a great example. NYC attracts a lot of tourists, some of whom might come from less vaccinated areas or even from overseas. People who have never seen a megacity want to see and experience one.

So, unfortunately, at least through this winter and into spring. We don't want to ease off on control of a respiratory virus in midwinter.

But also not never. Eventually we'll be no more worried about COVID-19 than about influenza and there's even a decent chance it will become less dangerous once we have enough population immunity built up.