Three years of COVID-19: how Oklahoma responded

Mar. 10—Saturday marks three years since COVID-19 drastically altered nearly every aspect of American society.

The virus began its spread throughout the world and country months earlier, but it was a "won't happen to me" issue for many until a basketball game in Oklahoma City that was supposed to be anything but extraordinary.

Utah Jazz center Rudy Gobert tested positive for coronavirus minutes before tip-off, the Thunder game was canceled and the NBA suspended its season.

Oklahoma City had one confirmed COVID-19 case on that night.

Three years later, the state has endured nearly 1.3 million cases and 16,000 deaths, according to data from the Oklahoma State Department of Health.

To many it seems as if the pandemic has come and gone as most people have resumed their normal lives, but the OSDH reported 4,986 active cases and 49 deaths for the week of Feb. 26 to March 4. Oklahoma has the fifth highest death rate per 100,000 people of any state in that span.

Most local businesses were closed for the first several weeks of the pandemic, and the City of Stillwater made national headlines in late April and early May of 2020 when it mandated all employees and clients to wear masks — but rescinded the order after City officials said residents directed threats of violence at employees.

For some, defiance to preventative action like mask-wearing or vaccines became a political or conspiratorial demonstration.

Gov. Kevin Stitt faced online backlash and praise from both sides of the political spectrum when he posted a photo of himself and his kids in a crowded restaurant less than a week after the canceled Thunder game. He would later that year become the first United States governor known to have contracted COVID-19.

The country eventually launched the most aggressive vaccination campaign in history under both President Donald Trump and President Joe Biden.

Now, almost 2.4 million Oklahomans or 60 percent of the state population are considered fully vaccinated. In total, 6.73 million doses have been administered to Oklahomans.

Two-thirds of residents in Payne County have received at least one dose of the vaccine, which ranks 17th in the state. Oklahoma County has the highest vaccination rate with a staggering 94 percent of its residents receiving at least one dose.

The OSDH is beginning its transition toward the endemic phase of this pandemic. It committed to publishing weekly data on COVID-19 for one more year, but that is expected to end in 2024.

The World Health Organization said in December it was hopeful COVID-19 will no longer be a global health emergency at some point in 2023.

Gone are the plastic shields at restaurants and stickers on the floor so people can stand six feet apart in public. March 11, 2020, simultaneously seems like it was only yesterday and in the much more distant past.