Is COVID Over? 3 Areas of Life That Have Returned to Normal. 3 That Have Not

New Studies Gives a Clearer Report Card of What Americans Are Willing to Do Right Now

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Earlier this month, President Joe Biden declared that COVID-19 is no longer the menace it once was.

“The pandemic is over,"Biden said during a 60 Minutes interview. “We still have a problem with COVID. We’re still doing a lot of work on it. But the pandemic is over."

In many ways, the president is stating the obvious. Everyday life seems far less burdened by COVID precautions than at any time in memory. We now have multiple vaccines and life-saving treatments. On the other hand, as his own administration quickly qualified, variants are unpredictable, and the country is still experiencing an average of 350 deaths, and one in five Americans suffer from the baffling symptoms of long COVID.

But all this chatter about terminology misses the larger point: COVID is still affecting different parts of life—and different parts of the economy—in different ways. A wave of new research in recent days helps give us a clearer picture. Here, based on those data, are three parts of daily life that have recovered from COVID and three parts that still lag:

Back to Normal

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1. Live Concerts

The biggest event in New York this fall was the record-setting, 15-show run by Harry Styles at Madison Square Garden. The series was a sign of how successful pop music has been at bouncing back from the pandemic slowdown. Live Nation Entertainment sold more than 100 million tickets through July, compared to 74 million during the same months of 2019, Joe Berchtold, the company’s president, told the Washington Post.

But the Styles say it’s also a symbol of how COVID reshaped pop, music with longer stays. Here’s how the New York Times captured the significance:

Besides Styles’s, high-profile residencies have been completed recently by the K-pop phenom BTS and the Mexican rock band Maná, which has booked 12 dates since March at the Forum, the group’s only performances in the United States all year. In Las Vegas, the place that arguably birthed the residency format, Adele will begin a 32-date weekend engagement at Caesars Palace in November, and Katy Perry and Miranda Lambert also have dates lined up for the fall.

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2. Weddings

Weddings have become so popular there’s been a glut. As I discussed this summer on The Nonlinear Life, a whopping 2.5 million weddings are slated to happen in the United States this year, according to the research firm the Wedding Report. That figure doesn’t include couples who eloped or got married in small ceremonies during the pandemic and are holding larger celebrations this summer.

Wedding bells became so loud that many guests started complaining. As the Wall Street Journal reported, “Wedding Guests Are Broke, Tired, and Begging for Mercy.

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3. Outdoor Sports

While gyms and indoor sports were among the most visible activities shut down by the pandemic. Remember when the NBA slammed the door in March 2020 with no notice? Now, outdoor sports are among the biggest gainers of post-pandemic life.

Pickleball is the poster child, up 40 percent; skateboarding is up 32 percent; tennis, 28 percent; and golf, 25 percent. Spectator sports, meanwhile, are not yet back to pre-pandemic life, with baseball reaching 90 percent of 2019 numbers this year.

Still Lagging

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1. Live Theater

While live music has been strong, live theater has struggled. As the New York Times reported, Broadway, opera, and dance have all failed to return to pre-pandemic levels.

Fewer than half as many people saw a Broadway show during the season that recently ended than did so during the last full season before the coronavirus pandemic. The Met Opera saw its paid attendance fall to 61 percent of capacity, down from 75 percent before the pandemic. Many regional theaters say ticket sales are down significantly.

A big reason for the difference: Pop concerts are largely attended by younger patrons, while theater is more popular among older consumers.

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2. Funerals

One of the lasting legacies of COVID may be the social acceptability—even the preferability—of online funerals. From my home in Brooklyn, I attended one in St. Louis last week. I’m clearly not alone. The National Funeral Directors Association published a report in August showing “significant impact” from the pandemic.

While some funeral homes already offered live streaming services, since the onset of the pandemic, more than half of NFDA-member funeral homes began doing so to help families safely gather while adhering to restrictions on public gatherings. Funeral homes are predicted to continue to expand this and other offerings – such as virtual funerals and an increased array of options to meet the needs of families with diverse cultural and faith traditions – in the future.

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3. Indoor Sports

The last area that has not come back is indoor fitness clubs. The Sports and Fitness Industry Association tracks youth and adult participation in sports. They found that indoor athletic activities have suffered the most. Stationary cycling is down 40 percent, cross-training workouts down 28 percent, and cardio kickboxing down 27 percent.

The bottom line: Giving a one-size-fits-all answer to the state of the pandemic is misleading. Outdoor activities are doing better than indoor ones; younger people are more embracing of risk than older people. Like so many other aspects of life in America these days, the polarization among generations is one of the strongest predictors of how we view the world.

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Or check out my books that inspired this newsletter: Life Is in the Transitions and The Secrets of Happy Families.

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