Three Scenarios for How This Ends

The question on everyone’s mind is this: When will things go back to normal?

My answer is never. The world is changed forever: No matter how deeply affected you are—medically, financially, emotionally, or otherwise—there is no going back.

But the decisions we make about how to proceed now are extremely consequential, and the potential outcomes before us are vastly different.

My colleague Ed Yong laid those out last week in a story headlined “How the Pandemic Will End.” The day after its release, he sat down (remotely) to talk with me and our colleague Katherine Wells about what he found out in the course of reporting.

What follows is a transcript of our conversation. You can also listen to the full episode of Social Distance here:

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This conversation has been edited and condensed for clarity.

Katherine Wells: It feels like we’re asking how this will end, but has it even started yet?

Ed Yong: I definitely think we’re not even close to the worst of it yet, sad to say. Cases are growing. We’re already seeing health-care workers and hospitals being overwhelmed, and those signs will become worse and more abundant as the coming days and weeks press on.

We need to steel ourselves for things getting worse, while at the same time also preparing and fighting for measures that might make things better.

It’s always perilous to look far into the future, especially for something as fast-moving as this. But I think there are two reasons why it’s important right now.

First, the choices we make immediately, not in the usual timeframes of crises, like within days or weeks—I mean literally right now—those choices are going to have a huge difference on how well the country fares in the future.

Secondly, even people who