LAUSR

There are many psychosocial issues emerging as we near the end of the pandemic phase of COVID-19 and enter an endemic stage. Some of these issues are related to anxiety and depression and others to grief and mourning. Many people are entering this endemic period with a degree of anxiety that they did not experience before the pandemic. People may feel anxious about entering an endemic phase and returning to our previous social relationships and situations while the pandemic goes on fueled now by the omicron variant and subvariants. This anxiety about returning to pre-pandemic social situations has been called social anxiety. Writing in the New Yorker (April 4, 2022) Jim Moore expressed it in poetry: “Someone will need to forgive me for being who I am, for sneaking back to my blue chair by the window, where for the last three hundred and seventy days I have learned that to be alone is what’s good for me. I am pretending as if I really belong to those who want to return to this world with open arms, even though it has done to us what it has done” (p. 60). Anxiety and depression related to the pandemic and the shutdown has been recognized since the start in March 2020. The Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC) partnered with the US Census Bureau to conduct pulse surveys to rapidly monitor changes in mental health status and access to care during the COVID-19 pandemic. During August 19, 2020–February 1, 2021, the percentage of adults with symptoms of an anxiety or a depressive disorder during the past 7 days increased significantly (from 36.4% to 41.5%), as did the percentage reporting that they needed but did not receive mental health counseling or therapy during the past 4 weeks (from 9.2% to 11.7%) (Vahratian et al., 2021). Significant increases were observed for all demographic subgroups presented, except adults aged ≥80 years and non-Hispanic adults reporting races other than White, Black, or Asian. The largest increases (8.0 and 7.8 percentage points) were among those aged 18–29 years and those with less than a high school education, respectively. During this time, mental health care treatment increased significantly from 22.4% to 24.8%. Significant increases were observed for adults aged 18–29, 30–39, and 60–69 years; men and women; non-Hispanic White and non-Hispanic Black adults; adults with at least a high school education; and adults who had not experienced symptoms of an anxiety or a depressive disorder during the past 7 days. Anxiety was related to fear of the disease, being shut in, loss of income, children at home and on-line learning. However, the anxiety that people are experiencing now entering a post pandemic/endemic phase—social anxiety— seems different and may come in a variety of forms. At the start of the COVID-19 pandemic more than two years ago, staying at home and physically distancing from others became necessary precautions to slow virus transmission and keep ourselves and our loved ones safe. Now, as people are returning to the office, mask mandates are lifting, and we begin to reemerge into society, connecting physically with others is becoming more and more part of our daily lives again. While some people may find this in-person socializing liberating after being cooped up for so long, others may face anxiety and distress in these renewed social situations (Welch, 2022). One reason for this anxiety is that a lot of people are simply out of practice; they are no longer comfortable or familiar with those former habits. There also may be anxiety related to pandemic protocols in social settings -uncertainty right now with how much to interact whether it’s appropriate to hug people or shake hands. Further complicating this, many people have different comfort levels when it comes to how they socialize (Welch, 2022). Is everyone OK with meeting in a large group? What if someone still wants to wear a mask? Many people are also still grappling with the effects of the politicization of safety precautions such as vaccines and mask-wearing. Now that mask mandates have been lifted in most cities, some may worry about being judged for their choice of wearing a mask or not wearing a mask (Welch, 2022). All these concerns may be the occasion for social anxiety. For people with pre-pandemic social anxiety/disorder, the experience differed. Buckner et al. (2021) studied 120 young adults living in Louisiana; they assessed whether anxiety