Abstract
BackgroundMany public health experts have claimed that elimination strategies of pandemic response allow ‘normal social life’ to resume. Recognizing that social connections and feelings of normality are important for public health, this study examines whether, and for whom, that goal is realized, and identifies obstacles that may inhibit its achievement.MethodsThematic analysis of narratives obtained via a qualitative cross-sectional survey of a community cohort in Aotearoa | New Zealand.ResultsA majority of participants reported that life after elimination was ‘more or less the same’ as before the pandemic. Some became more social. Nevertheless, a sizeable minority reported being less social, even many months after elimination. Key obstacles to social recovery included fears that the virus was circulating undetected and the enduring impact of lockdowns upon social relationships, personal habits and mental health. Within our sample, old age and underlying health conditions were both associated with a propensity to become less social.ConclusionsElimination strategies can successfully allow ‘normal social life’ to resume. However, this outcome is not guaranteed. People may encounter difficulties with re-establishing social connections in Zero-COVID settings. Measures designed to overcome such obstacles should be an integral part of elimination strategies.
Highlights
Since the onset of the COVID-19 pandemic, the respective merits of mitigation and elimination strategies have been hotly debated in public health circles.[1]
The New Zealand government cited ‘get[ting] back to a sense of normality’ as a reason to persist with its elimination strategy.[14]
966 of the 1040 survey respondents (92.9%) answered Q6.4—a ‘tick-box’ question about how their social life compared to life before the pandemic. 546 respondents (52.5% of the total) provided narrative elaborations
Summary
Since the onset of the COVID-19 pandemic, the respective merits of mitigation and elimination strategies have been hotly debated in public health circles.[1] In mitigation, the virus continues to circulate, albeit at reduced levels, due to non-pharmaceutical interventions (NPIs). Though vaccinations are playing an increasingly important role in international responses to COVID-19, the mitigation-elimination debate remains salient—both when vaccination rates remain low,[2] and when planning for future pandemics.[3]. Many public health experts have claimed that elimination strategies of pandemic response allow ‘normal social life’ to resume. Recognizing that social connections and feelings of normality are important for public health, this study examines whether, and for whom, that goal is realized, and identifies obstacles that may inhibit its achievement
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