Talk:COVID-19 pandemic

Current consensus

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01. Superseded by #9

The first few sentences of the lead's second paragraph should state The virus is typically spread during close contact and via respiratory droplets produced when people cough or sneeze. Respiratory droplets may be produced during breathing but the virus is not considered airborne. It may also spread when one touches a contaminated surface and then their face. It is most contagious when people are symptomatic, although spread may be possible before symptoms appear. (RfC March 2020)

02. Superseded by #7

The infobox should feature a per capita count map most prominently, and a total count by country map secondarily. (RfC March 2020)

03. Obsolete

The article should not use {{Current}} at the top. (March 2020)

04. Do not include a sentence in the lead section noting comparisons to World War II. (March 2020)

05. Cancelled

Include subsections covering the domestic responses of Italy, China, Iran, the United States, and South Korea. Do not include individual subsections for France, Germany, the Netherlands, Australia and Japan. (RfC March 2020) Include a short subsection on Sweden focusing on the policy controversy. (May 2020)

Subsequently overturned by editing and recognized as obsolete. (July 2024)

06. Obsolete

There is a 30 day moratorium on move requests until 26 April 2020. (March 2020)

07. There is no consensus that the infobox should feature a confirmed cases count map most prominently, and a deaths count map secondarily. (May 2020)

08. Superseded by #16

The clause on xenophobia in the lead section should read ...and there have been incidents of xenophobia and discrimination against Chinese people and against those perceived as being Chinese or as being from areas with high infection rates. (RfC April 2020)

09. Cancelled

Supersedes #1. The first several sentences of the lead section's second paragraph should state The virus is mainly spread during close contact and by small droplets produced when those infected cough, sneeze or talk. These droplets may also be produced during breathing; however, they rapidly fall to the ground or surfaces and are not generally spread through the air over large distances. People may also become infected by touching a contaminated surface and then their face. The virus can survive on surfaces for up to 72 hours. Coronavirus is most contagious during the first three days after onset of symptoms, although spread may be possible before symptoms appear and in later stages of the disease. (April 2020)

Notes

On 17:16, 6 April 2020, these first several sentences were replaced with an extracted fragment from the coronavirus disease 2019 article, which at the time was last edited at 17:11.

010. The article title is COVID-19 pandemic. The title of related pages should follow this scheme as well. (RM April 2020, RM August 2020)

011. The lead section should use Wuhan, China to describe the virus's origin, without mentioning Hubei or otherwise further describing Wuhan. (April 2020)

012. Superseded by #19

The lead section's second sentence should be phrased using the words first identified and December 2019. (May 2020)

013. Superseded by #15

File:President Donald Trump suggests measures to treat COVID-19 during Coronavirus Task Force press briefing.webm should be used as the visual element of the misinformation section, with the caption U.S. president Donald Trump suggested at a press briefing on 23 April that disinfectant injections or exposure to ultraviolet light might help treat COVID-19. There is no evidence that either could be a viable method. (1:05 min) (May 2020, June 2020)

014. Overturned

Do not mention the theory that the virus was accidentally leaked from a laboratory in the article. (RfC May 2020) This result was overturned at Wikipedia:Administrators' noticeboard, as there is consensus that there is no consensus to include or exclude the lab leak theory. (RfC May 2024)

015. Supersedes #13. File:President Donald Trump suggests measures to treat COVID-19 during Coronavirus Task Force press briefing.webm should not be used as the visual element of the misinformation section. (RfC November 2020)

016. Supersedes #8. Incidents of xenophobia and discrimination are considered WP:UNDUE for a full sentence in the lead. (RfC January 2021)

017. Only include one photograph in the infobox. There is no clear consensus that File:COVID-19 Nurse (cropped).jpg should be that one photograph. (May 2021)

018. Superseded by #19

The first sentence is The COVID-19 pandemic, also known as the coronavirus pandemic, is a global pandemic of coronavirus disease 2019 (COVID-19) caused by severe acute respiratory syndrome coronavirus 2 (SARS-CoV-2). (August 2021, RfC October 2023)

019. Supersedes #12 and #18. The first sentence is The global COVID-19 pandemic (also known as the coronavirus pandemic), caused by severe acute respiratory syndrome coronavirus 2 (SARS-CoV-2), began with an outbreak in Wuhan, China, in December 2019. (June 2024)

Also known as?

Isn't it also Wuhan coronavirus? 2600:4040:AEBB:AD00:BD04:C964:47E0:365C (talk) 12:19, 30 August 2025 (UTC)

source?--Ozzie10aaaa (talk) 12:25, 30 August 2025 (UTC)

Only among conservatives/racists. Dricoust (talk) 02:51, 3 April 2026 (UTC)

The pandemic is over

Why does the lead insinuate the pandemic is still ongoing? Yes the disease is still around but it is going to be around till the end of time. I don't see a reason for the article to suggest the pandemic is still ongoing. Almost if not all countries have reigned back their COVID restrictions seen at the peak of COVID. User1519203 (talk) 11:46, 14 September 2025 (UTC)

Content in Wikipedia depends on what reliable sources say, not your opinion. HiLo48 (talk) 23:51, 14 September 2025 (UTC)

Agreed but it should be highlighted that the pandemic being ongoing is somewhat controversial. Much of the world started opening up again in 2021, though very slowly. By the end of 2023, there have practically been zero places in the world that still treat COVID-19 as seriously as they did before. It's almost 2026 now. Historians are almost certainly going to agree that COVID as a pandemic ended in 2023 because of WHO's declaration. It should be noted that back in January 2021, as many as 100k people would die every single week of COVID. The most recent reported week being the last week of September and early October 2025, reported only 79 deaths worldwide of COVID during that time frame. And very rarely do modern sources speak of COVID in the present tense.

Of course my own research doesn't qualify for a Wikipedia citation (original research) but the data is out there if you search for it on WHO's website. We've been sitting at 7.1M confirmed deaths for a long while now. No new news has really come out of COVID since 2023 or even 2024 if you're lucky. My overall point is that the pandemic being over is a footnote in the main section. The history section doesn't even have any section for years after 2023. MountainJew6150 (talk) 05:17, 19 October 2025 (UTC)

Actually, I take part of this back. The main section doesn't use the word "ongoing". The diction is a little strange for the first paragraph, however. And I still do stand by the need to emphasize that COVID deaths and infections have significantly declined in recent years. MountainJew6150 (talk) 05:26, 19 October 2025 (UTC)

Historians will tell you that the AIDS epidemic is still going.

And so is the Covid pandemic.

The era of bothering to track Covid deaths ended. That didn't mean the deaths stopped. Since Covid causes heart attacks which happen six months later, they're just not being *tracked* as Covid deaths.

If you check the data seriously, and many people have, the deaths are still going strong, they're just not being counted in most places. ~2025-44037-06 (talk) 21:54, 31 December 2025 (UTC)

AIDS kills about 12k people a week, which is actually WAY more than it killed weekly in the 1980s. COVID-19 kills about 300 people a week. COVID-19 used to kill over 100k people a week. It's not "going strong." It's become yet another flu, so much so that we have a so-called "COVID-19 season" that coincides with Flu season, and the flu kills more people weekly than COVID does now btw.

Also, it's never been counted in most places to begin with. Obviously North Korea isn't submitting reliable COVID-19 data. And obviously most parts of Africa don't have the ability to confirm COVID deaths a lot of the time. It's under reported but so is just about everything else, including AIDS and flu deaths. The point is that COVID-19 hasn't been a public health concern in nearly 3 years and the number gets closer to zero every year at an insane rate. Modern day COVID deaths are simply a statistic of COVID season, not the 2020-23 pandemic. MountainJew6150 (talk) 17:49, 20 January 2026 (UTC)

Yes the pandemic is over it’s now the virus itself is still going as normal level now ~2026-34776-85 (talk) 14:22, 12 June 2026 (UTC)

So I'm tying up some loose ends on stuff and thought I'd drop some sources to help out:

• There are no widely accepted, quantitative definitions for the end of a pandemic such as COVID-19. The end of the pandemic due to a new virus and the transition to endemicity may be defined based on a high proportion of the global population having some immunity from natural infection or vaccination. Other considerations include diminished death toll, diminished pressure on health systems, reduced actual and perceived personal risk, removal of restrictive measures and diminished public attention. A threshold of 70% of the global population having being vaccinated or infected was probably already reached in the second half of 2021. Endemicity may still show major spikes of infections and seasonality, but typically less clinical burden, although some locations are still hit more than others. Death toll and ICU occupancy figures are also consistent with a transition to endemicity by end 2021/early 2022. Personal risk of the vast majority of the global population was already very small by end 2021, but perceived risk may still be grossly overestimated. Restrictive measures of high stringency have persisted in many countries by early 2022. The gargantuan attention in news media, social media and even scientific circles should be tempered. Public health officials need to declare the end of the pandemic. Mid- and long-term consequences of epidemic waves and of adopted measures on health, society, economy, civilization and democracy may perpetuate a pandemic legacy long after the pandemic itself has ended.

  — From European Journal of Clinical Investigation, The end of the COVID-19 pandemic

• The coronavirus disease 2019 (COVID-19) pandemic has resulted in significant global mortality and morbidity affecting millions of lives. As healthcare authorities worldwide are still paying substantial attention to COVID-19, other diseases continue to cause more deaths than COVID-19. The decreasing number of COVID-19 cases and deaths indicates that the pandemic is close to the end. For effective pandemic management, healthcare facilities worldwide have established COVID-19 units and testing facilities, instituting infection prevention and control measures, and employing telehealth services. Healthcare professionals have identified some promising treatments for COVID-19; also, mass vaccinations have improved patient outcomes. Instead of COVID-19 as a pandemic, it is time to pay more attention to other diseases to lessen their impact on public health. Therefore, the World Health Organization (WHO) has declared the end of the pandemic phase of COVID-19 considering the current COVID-19 situation and our preparedness, past pandemic experience, and long pandemic impact on social and economic life on May 5, 2023. In this article, we briefly discussed the present challenges due to COVID-19, necessary precautions, and future directions to return to life as before COVID-19.

  — From Health science reports, The WHO has declared the end of pandemic phase of COVID-19: Way to come back in the normal life'

• The era of extraordinary measures by government and societies to control SARS-CoV-2 transmission will be over. After the omicron wave, COVID-19 will return but the pandemic will not.

  — From The Lancet, COVID-19 will continue but the end of the pandemic is near

These should help put a bow on the article. GeogSage ^{(⚔Chat?⚔)} 05:38, 19 October 2025 (UTC)

These are bad articles. WHO specifically said the pandemic was continuing, when they announced the end of the "public health emergency". Epidemiologically, the pandemic continues.

Ending particular response measures doesn't end the pandemic.

If you look at the death numbers and the disaiblity numbers and the case numbers, the pandemic is definitely still going. It isn't over just because people decide not to do anything about it. ~2025-44037-06 (talk) 21:51, 31 December 2025 (UTC)

The question isn't if COVID-19 still exists, it is mostly if it is has become an endemic disease or not. There will always be a baseline of COVID unless something changes, baseline is not a pandemic. GeogSage ^{(⚔Chat?⚔)} 01:58, 13 May 2026 (UTC)

This only came up due to some drive-by tinkering with the first paragraph over the last month or so. I have restored the long-standing consensus version, per Talk:COVID-19 pandemic#Current consensus point 19. Crossroads ^-talk- 18:49, 20 October 2025 (UTC)

The pandemic is definitely still going on, as literally every scientist agrees including WHO. There is zero evidence that it is "over" other than unsourced speculation. ~2025-44037-06 (talk) 21:49, 31 December 2025 (UTC)

Many scientists actually do say it is no longer a pandemic, and the WHO does not make such official assessments anyway. Crossroads ^-talk- 20:41, 6 January 2026 (UTC)

Indeed, this is a matter of WP:Verification. The article will require novel sources across time that maintain the demonstration of a pandemic for our purposes.

The three journals posted above are out of date (>2years). SmolBrane (talk) 19:12, 20 January 2026 (UTC)

I'm not sure I agree with journals that are greater then 2 years being out of date. Is there an official policy on this? The insistence on covering the bleeding edge of research is useful when doing research, but when making an encyclopedia the facts are what matter, and a pandemic being over is something that won't be regurgitated forever in new literature. GeogSage ^{(⚔Chat?⚔)} 03:25, 21 January 2026 (UTC)

WP:AGE MATTERS and WP:MEDDATE. RSes are prone to time decay. An ongoing pandemic fails verification unless an editor can provide a current reliable source. The existence of a pandemic is synthesis until verified. Bleeding edge doesn't apply here. SmolBrane (talk) 16:04, 21 January 2026 (UTC)

We could check to what extent our top sources from the last year use the present vs past tense to help us answer this question. The section 'COVID-19_pandemic#Transition_to_later_phases' feels out of date, with so many statements from people in 2022/2023 disagreeing about whether the end is reached or not. —Femke 🐦 (talk) 17:44, 25 January 2026 (UTC)

Looking at present vs past tense is an interesting approach, I agree it could be useful. In my day job I do some research involving COVID-19, and the vibe I get is that a pandemic isn't like a war, there isn't really a good clear "end," so we might struggle to find sources that declare it "over." As it is essentially just fading into history, tense is a really smart approach, and honestly could be a good study IRL. GeogSage ^{(⚔Chat?⚔)} 05:37, 26 January 2026 (UTC)

I do find that the language used in this article is awkward and non committal. Hydronym89 (talk) 00:34, 12 February 2026 (UTC)

Improving top-importance medicine articles: Join the Vital Signs campaign 2026

The goal of the Wikipedia:WikiProject Medicine/Vital Signs 2026 campaign is to bring all 101 top-importance articles—including this one—up to at least B-class quality. Many of these articles are widely read but overdue for review, so even small improvements can have a big impact.

If you watch or edit this article, your help would be very welcome. You can:

1. Add yourself as a participant
2. Note the state of the article in the Progress table (is the current class still correct?)
3. Update the article based on recent clinical guidelines and review papers
4. Help address gaps, improve clarity for a broad audience, or improve image selection

To reach B class, articles should have: suitable referencing, reasonable coverage, a clear structure, good prose, helpful illustrations, and be understandable to a broad audience. Contributions of any size are appreciated. Femke (talk) 16:00, 20 December 2025 (UTC)

thank you--Ozzie10aaaa (talk) 16:31, 20 December 2025 (UTC)

The source of the virus

The source of the virus was the Wuhan laboratory!! where this and other viruses were being studied!!! And there was an accidental or deliberate leak from this lab, and China paid nothing for either the deaths or the damage!!!--Rapidfirreee (talk) 04:19, 12 May 2026 (UTC)

Wikipedia is not the place for your conspiratorial ramblings. Llamevia (talk) 11:27, 12 May 2026 (UTC)

It is not a conspiracy theory nor a rambling, there are documents about the Wuhan laboratory! Rapidfirreee (talk) 22:36, 12 May 2026 (UTC)

We need multiple sources. Per the one linked below, "The problem for the lab-leak position is that the U.S. has never had access to the Wuhan lab and has thus been unable to reach a definitive answer for more than five years. Now that the CIA has at last come to a conclusion, not all scientists are sold on what it has reported, seeing the results as thinly scientifically sourced." GeogSage ^{(⚔Chat?⚔)} 23:47, 12 May 2026 (UTC)

The WHO has not ruled out the lab-leak hypothesis, so I'm not sure why you would label it a conspiracy theory, especially considering that lab leaks are not uncommon. For example, the H1N1 influenza strain had gone extinct in the wild but was later reintroduced into the human population following a lab leak.

https://www.who.int/news/item/27-06-2025-who-scientific-advisory-group-issues-report-on-origins-of-covid-19 Wellthisisanaccount (talk) 22:09, 22 June 2026 (UTC)

Your source quotes Ghebreyesus: "all hypotheses must remain on the table" but it also says SAGO "concluded that “the weight of available evidence…suggests zoonotic spillover…either directly from bats or through an intermediate host.”" This is exactly what our article says: lab leak is possible but unlikely. It is what scientists have said since 2020, and it is what our article has said since 2020. The evidence has not changed since then. And when somebody says The source of the virus was the Wuhan laboratory!! instead of "possible but unlikely", that person believes in a heap of bullshit emanating from conspiracy theorists and ignores the scientific consensus.

"lab leaks are not uncommon" - well, crows are not uncommon but that would not be a reason to claim that the room I am in contains a crow. You have to look at the concrete evidence, and the evidence says no. Superficial it-is-possible pseudologic does not help. --Hob Gadling (talk) 07:09, 23 June 2026 (UTC)

References

Graphic re pandemic's effect on social isolation

Chart 1: Research suggests that the COVID pandemic increased social isolation for those who lived alone and worked in jobs that could be performed remotely. Their isolation levels did not return to pre-pandemic levels. (Source:Emanuel, Natalia; Harrington, Emma; Pallais, Amanda (4 June 2026). "Home alone: Remote work, isolation, and mental health". Science. 392 (6802). doi:10.1126/science.aec7671.)

@Bon courage: You have removed instances of this chart in COVID-19 pandemic and Mental health during the COVID-19 pandemic and Impact of the COVID-19 pandemic on other health issues with the edit comment, "Primary/undue".

1. "Primary": It's true that the Science source isn't a survey article, but the quantity being charted (spending whole days alone) isn't so medical or technical that it warrants a Wikipedia:MEDRS level of scrutiny. Can you explain what you mean by bringing up (presumably) WP:PRIMARY?
2. "Undue": I think that a chart of growing social isolation, especially its endurance after the pandemic, is notable and significant. Can you explain why you thought including it is (presumably) WP:UNDUE?

Thanks. —RCraig09 (talk) 22:39, 22 June 2026 (UTC)

It would require MEDRS since you inserted it (3 times) in sections about human health. It is also USA-only though not presented as such. A lot of primary research is wrong, which is why we need secondaries to validate it. If secondary sources have ignored this work, why should Wikipedia pay attention to it? Bon courage (talk) 04:35, 23 June 2026 (UTC)

(I've added "(US)" to the in-graphic title.) The chart is about spending all day alone so it's not directly "about human health" though the Emanuel et al. article does deal with that. The Emanuel et al. article hasn't been around so long that we can judge whether it will be "ignored" (Science has [https://www.science.org/doi/10.1126/science.aeh9559 another article (Zang et al.) citing Emanuel et al), but I see your points. I will let the issue rest. —RCraig09 (talk) 06:02, 23 June 2026 (UTC)

Is there a subarticle this could possibly be placed in, User:RCraig09? For graph design, I'd make the legend lines thinner to match the figure line width. Took me a while to connec the dots. In solidarity, —Femke (talk) 🐦 06:25, 23 June 2026 (UTC)

Since the source is about mental health impacts it would be at Mental health during the COVID-19 pandemic, but it's not reliable for statements about mental health. I'd question whether primary research about what might have happened in one country is due, except maybe at COVID-19 pandemic in the United States? Bon courage (talk) 07:07, 23 June 2026 (UTC)

Chart 2: Uploaded 23 June (deprecated by uploader as of 25 June), same data as Chart 1 but normalized to 2019 "pre-pandemic") levels

(I've made lines in legend thinner.) Though the source discusses and charts health impacts, the chart itself is about days spent alone. I think the distinction is important. More generally, I think the issue of enduring social isolation is notable. —RCraig09 (talk) 15:31, 23 June 2026 (UTC)

Well, even if we assume the research is correct (which we don't know), it's only up to 2024 in America. So we can't extrapolate that into a statement about the present. I'd not object to it going into the USA article with suitable caveats. Bon courage (talk) 15:54, 23 June 2026 (UTC)

Chart 3: Uploaded 25 June. Uses 2022-2019 average (not just 2019) as "pre-pandemic" baseline for percentage comparison.

I've inserted the chart into COVID-19 pandemic in the United States and Social impact of the COVID-19 pandemic in the United States. Caveats can be added to the captions if needed. —RCraig09 (talk) 17:10, 23 June 2026 (UTC)

@Bon courage and Femke: I've also created Chart 2 at right, which normalizes the data to 2019 (pre-pandemic) levels. It doesn't affect any of the substantive issues we've discussed above, but the normalized values tell a more nuanced story than the raw-data chart. I'm considering adding the normalized-data chart alongside the raw data chart in some of the locations where it now stands. Comments are welcome. —RCraig09 (talk) 20:10, 23 June 2026 (UTC)

I find that graph much more difficult to follow. I think percentage difference from a noisy baseline doesn't make for a very intuitive graph. In solidarity, —Femke (talk) 🐦 20:27, 23 June 2026 (UTC)

The original data skips a year. In general we should be heeding WP:PRIMARY: "A primary source may be used on Wikipedia only to make straightforward, descriptive statements of facts that can be verified by any educated person with access to the primary source". Bon courage (talk) 23:19, 23 June 2026 (UTC)

I've uploaded Chart 3 which broadens the "pre-pandemic" baseline to 2011-2019 to appear less 'noisy' than Chart 2 (which I now deprecate :-). Sorry, I'm not seeing how "the original data skips a year"; Emanuel et al. say they "omit" 2020-2021 yet provide annual data from 2011-2024. Re WP:Primary: the source "drew on five nationally representative surveys" and thus appears more like a secondary source for the raw data, but that is arguable. Separately, after comparing the "share of people" data in Chart 1 to the "percent increase in people" data in Chart 3, I'm pondering how best to write the captions. —RCraig09 (talk) 05:39, 25 June 2026 (UTC)

To me, version 1 is superior still to the other graph. The percent increase is just too noisy, however you plot it. Agree that this file can be used in the two articles you added it to. In solidarity, —Femke (talk) 🐦 06:19, 25 June 2026 (UTC)

I completely agree that the results of Chart 1 are more easily interpreted than the results of Chart 3... but that's what the data reveals. I plan to place Charts 1 and 3 side-by-side because they distinguish the data of (raw) "shares of people" versus (normalized) "increases since Covid"—they lead to distinct conclusions. I'm still pondering the exact captions. —RCraig09 (talk) 14:57, 25 June 2026 (UTC)

I do not think the second graph adds much. You can see the increase from the first graph. Putting images side-by-side can cause accessibility problems with surrounding text. On many screens 2 images can work, but not on smaller ones; the line lenght becomes too small. In solidarity, —Femke (talk) 🐦 15:43, 25 June 2026 (UTC)

In the two US-specific articles linked above, I've added a caption to Chart 3 that explains what Chart 3 shows better than Chart 1: "Though the raw share of socially isolated people living alone is greater than those who live with family (see other chart^{(Chart 1}), the present chart shows that the increase in pandemic-related social isolation was also experienced by those living with family." I know it's a long caption, but I think the endurance of social isolation in the US is important. Thanks to both of you for your helpful observations. —RCraig09 (talk) 21:45, 25 June 2026 (UTC)