Where many countries around the world are still struggling to get the virus under control, many other countries with a high % of vaccinated people are ready to open again. But what will the new "normal" look like? If countries only keep looking at the infection rates from themselves and their neighbours, not much will change.

Let's take the Netherlands as an example. With over 80% of people who got a first shot and over 50% that got 2 shots, you would think we could open again. And that's what we did. The result was an enormous spike in cases. Europe gave us the dark red status and with that, we became the pariah of Europe.

If we keep measuring by these standards going forward there will be no end in sight. I never thought I would make this statement, but Trump was right. More testing means more cases. Obviously, he was an idiot about it, but in the case of the Netherlands, it made sense.

What do you get when 300.000 teens and tweens are getting tested over a weekend to gain entrance into a bar or club? Positief cases! That's what happened in the Netherlands. But hardly any to no deaths and a very slight uptake in hospitalizations.

When we then decided to implement certain restrictions again, it was clear that the cases would drop very hard. you can see that all this happened within a span of a couple of weeks.

http://i.prntscr.com/yKR6aS8US__aM7wOsGmtSA.png

In one week we should be back in GREEN territory but then what? How are things going to be different next time we open those places frequented by younger people? True, many more young people will be vaccinated but I still foresee a rise in cases when those venues open again. If we keep using the "cases" metric, things will not change. At some point, we are going to have to accept that people will get infected for whatever reason and live with it.

I'm obviously referring to countries where everyone willing was able to get a shot.