FILE - People wait in a long line to get tested for COVID-19 in Times Square, New York, Dec. 20, 2021. For the second year in a row, the ever-morphing coronavirus presents would-be holiday revelers with a difficult choice: cancel their trips and celebrations yet again or figure out how to forge ahead as safely as possible. Many health experts are begging people not to let down their guard, but pandemic fatigue is real. While travel restrictions in some places have forced cancellations, many governments have been reluctant to order more lockdowns. (AP Photo/Seth Wenig, file)
FILE - People wait in a long line to get tested for COVID-19 in Times Square, New York, Dec. 20, 2021. For the second year in a row, the ever-morphing coronavirus presents would-be holiday revelers with a difficult choice: cancel their trips and celebrations yet again or figure out how to forge ahead as safely as possible. Many health experts are begging people not to let down their guard, but pandemic fatigue is real. While travel restrictions in some places have forced cancellations, many governments have been reluctant to order more lockdowns. (AP Photo/Seth Wenig, file) Credit: Seth Wenig

This latest COVID-19 omicron outbreak has resulted in widespread COVID fatigue and seriously compromised our ability to control the pandemic.

For those who believe that COVID-19 is not a hoax, there are only two ways to control its spread: a proven prophylactic such as a vaccine or a therapeutic, and physical measures that lessen the odds that the virus can enter your body, such as a barrier or distance from infected people.

To strive for a better outcome, we need to review why we are at this point and the lessons learned. The starting point is the issue of whether people should be free to disregard the scientific recommendations of public health experts — is this the price we all must pay for some minority of people’s misguided concept of personal freedom?

A personal freedom that has contributed to the infection of hundreds of thousands more every day with kids hospitalized in record numbers, created further job shortages in all industries, exacerbated the crises in goods and services, initiated a new inflationary cycle, shuttered thousands more businesses, once again compromised the education of our children, created deadly shortages in hospital beds and services, led to the exit of thousands of critical healthcare providers, added to our national debt and caused a surge in those seeking mental health care.

The tragic irony of this misguided interpretation of personal freedom is that it has instead taken away many of our cherished freedoms with no end in sight. With billions of people in the world unvaccinated or under-vaccinated, the virus continues to mutate in these reservoirs, posing a threat to those who are protected. With more infectious variants resulting from this mutation process, it may be only a matter of time before more lethal and infectious variants arise.

While some in the minority will not admit it, most, if not all of us have benefited from the advances in medical diagnosis and treatment. To the naysayers, I must ask the question: to what end? How does this disregard of the scientific method lead to a future where we all can live freely in a safe and prosperous country?

(Walter King lives in Dover.)