Over half of Democrats do not believe the Covid-19 pandemic is over, new polling from Gallup has shown.

The poll found that only 41% of Democrats say the pandemic is over, versus 79% of Republicans and 63% of independent voters who think the same. At the same time, 57% of all US adults report that their lives have not returned to normal, and 43% expect they never will.

While those on the Left of the spectrum in particular have clung onto the belief that the pandemic is not over, the overall percentage of pandemic-fearing Americans actually rose to 47% last September before steadily falling to 41% today.

This attitude comes in spite of President Joe Biden telling CBS in September 2022 that the “pandemic is over”. He was met with immediate resistance from his own administration, as well as from the media and the public health establishment.

Press coverage has played a role in this partisan split over Covid, with Left-leaning mainstream outlets continuing to publish articles which raise fears over the persistent dangers of the disease. “Covid isn’t over, and we shouldn’t act like it is,” a letter run in the Washington Post declared just last month. “Covid is back, and the U.S. is unprepared for the next bug,” read a January headline from the same outlet’s editorial board. Also that month, the New Republic warned that “Democrats can’t keep ignoring Covid in 2024.”

The vast majority of Americans say they’ve already had Covid, and the share of Americans who are somewhat or very worried about the virus has fallen from a 2020 peak of 59% to 20% today.

The rates of hospitalisation for the virus have decreased annually for the past three years and were at an all-time low this winter, according to CDC data.

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is UnHerd’s US correspondent.

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