By Nathalie Voit
A majority of Americans are optimistic about the trajectory of the COVID-19 pandemic, a Gallup poll released on March 7 found.
When polled by Gallup about the state of the pandemic, just one-third of respondents (34%) said they were worried about contracting COVID-19, down from 50% in January. Additionally, nearly two-thirds of respondents (63%) held positive expectations regarding the direction of the pandemic. The news was a drastic improvement from January when just one-fifth of respondents (20%) thought the public health situation in the U.S. was improving.
The number of U.S. adults expressing optimism about the trajectory of the pandemic is the highest since June 2021, before the Delta and Omicron variants of COVID-19 sharply downgraded the public’s assessment of the situation. For reference, three in 10 Americans thought the pandemic was over then.
However, 55% of U.S. adults remain concerned about the possibility of future COVID-19 strains, and two-thirds expect the pandemic to persist past 2022, according to Gallup’s latest COVID-19 tracking survey. Additionally, Gallup said one-half of those surveyed said they were worried about unvaccinated people.
The survey reveals lingering skepticism despite an overall improved pandemic outlook.
“With COVID-19 cases, hospitalizations and deaths declining in the wake of the omicron surge, Americans’ views of the state of the pandemic are sharply improved,” Gallup wrote. “Yet, Americans remain largely unconvinced that the end of the pandemic is near, and a majority still worry about the spread of new strains of the virus. With many Americans not fully or at all vaccinated, the U.S. remains vulnerable to new variants.”
