How Close Is the Pandemic’s End?

<p>It’s been almost a year since the World Health Organization declared the coronavirus outbreak a pandemic.</p><p>And the virus is persisting: A downward trend in the U.S. caseload has stalled, and concern about the impact of variants is growing. Yet inoculations are on the rise, and the F.D.A. has approved Johnson & Johnson’s single-dose vaccine, the third to be approved in the U.S.</p><p>Today, we check in on the latest about the coronavirus.</p><p> </p><p>Guest: <a href="https://www.nytimes.com/by/carl-zimmer?smid=pc-thedaily">Carl Zimmer</a>, a science writer and author of the “Matter” column for The New York Times. </p><p>   </p><p><a href="https://www.nytimes.com/newsletters/signup/NTTD?smid=pc-thedaily">Sign up here</a> to get The Daily in your inbox each morning. And for an exclusive look at how the biggest stories on our show come together, <a href="https://www.nytimes.com/newsletters/the-daily?module=inline">subscribe to our newsletter</a>. </p><p>Background reading: </p><ul><li>After the Johnson & Johnson vaccine approval, President Biden vowed that there would be<a href="https://www.nytimes.com/2021/03/02/us/politics/merck-johnson-johnson-vaccine.html?smid=pc-thedaily"> enough vaccine doses for “every adult in America”</a> by the end of May.</li><li>For more information about the emerging mutations, check out<a href="https://www.nytimes.com/interactive/2021/health/coronavirus-variant-tracker.html?searchResultPosition=5?smid=pc-thedaily"> The Times’s variant tracker. </a></li></ul><p>For more information on today’s episode, visit <a href="http://nytimes.com/thedaily?smid=pc-thedaily">nytimes.com/thedaily.</a></p><p> Transcripts of each episode will be made available by the next workday.</p>