Early evidence from the UK
The silver lining (if there is one) is in the early evidence from the UK.
Benchmarking cases, hospitalizations and deaths to their respective peaks from last winter (credit to John Burn-Murdoch's work on this) shows that the more serious COVID metrics are still way down on where they were last winter — despite cases surging to all-time highs.
There is of course a lag between cases and the more serious outcomes, which is why watching the UK data over the next few weeks will be a crucial indicator for how the US Omicron wave (and waves in other well-vaccinated countries) might play out.
