A poll conducted by The Associated Press in conjunction with the NORC Center for Public Affairs Research revealed that “management of the coronavirus pandemic” is “beginning to recede in the minds of Americans.”

The report notes that the virus “is increasingly overshadowed by concerned about the economy and personal finances – particularly inflation – which are topics that could lift Republicans.”

The author continued:

Just 37% of Americans name the virus as one of their top five priorities for the government to work on in 2022, compared with 53% who said it was a leading priority at the same time a year ago. The economy outpaced the pandemic in the open-ended question, with 68% of respondents mentioning it in some way as a top 2022 concern. A similar percentage said the same last year, but mentions of inflation are much higher now: 14% this year, compared with less than 1% last year.

Consumer prices jumped 6.8% for the 12 months ending in November, a nearly four-decade high. Meanwhile, roughly twice as many Americans now mention their household finances, namely, the cost of living, as a governmental priority, 24% vs. 12% last year.

Mary Small, a pharmaceutical research contractor in Pennsylvania, told The AP that people seem to be moving on from the COVID issue. “If we say anything along the lines of ‘Let’s wait until the pandemic dies down,’ well, this son of a gun virus has unlimited ability to mutate,” she said. “We might never be done with this.”

Indeed, the result of the poll suggests we might be seeing the beginning of the post-COVID era in which more Americans are ready to move on to other issues instead of constantly worrying about the pandemic. The fact that the Omicron variant has proven to be far less deadly than the Alpha and Delta variants appears to be setting the stage for this paradigm shift to occur.

Even some members of the Biden administration seem to understand that the country might be moving on. Surgeon General Vivek Murthy acknowledged that “[p]andemic fatigue is real” and that when people get “tired and beaten down by a health problem … it can lead to disengagement.”

Perhaps the results of this survey show that this “disengagement” to which Murthy referred is becoming a reality. The administration has attempted to spin this new trend, suggesting that it is a result of its policies. The AP noted:

The White House says COVID-19′s waning as a preeminent concern actually underscores its success rolling out preventative measures, including vaccines. It argues that economic jitters now exacerbated by the pandemic eventually will ease.

However, this might not redound on Democrats as positively as the White House would like to think. Adam Brandon, president of FreedomWorks, a conservative activist group, argued this trend is “not the victory the Democrats thought it would be.” He continued:

“We’ll have another wave next year, and I just don’t think anyone’s going to care. I think we’re going to get to a point where everyone’s just going to have to learn to live with it. This will die with a whimper as people just lose interest.”

This scenario seems most likely. It is not that people will credit the White House with getting America through the pandemic; it is that they will simply stop caring about the matter altogether as the urge to get back to normal life becomes more prevalent than fears over the virus. People wish to focus on more pressing issues than a coronavirus that 99 percent of those who are infected will survive.

Americans’ concern over the economy is not a good sign for Biden and his merry band of Democrats in Congress. With inflation and supply chain issues continuing to affect everyday Americans, things aren’t looking so great for the left. No amount of deflection or distraction will save Democratic politicians in November. If they don’t get a handle on these problems and the other issues facing the country, there will be a political massacre the likes of which we haven’t seen for decades.