Overview:
The United States must go back to work to avoid lasting economic damage from the coronavirus shutdown. Failure to take sensible precautions could however repeat the mistakes of 1918, when premature relaxation of countermeasures resulted in unnecessary deaths and hospitalizations.

There are fortunately off-the-shelf non-pharmaceutical interventions (NPIs) that can reduce opportunities for contagion, along with administrative controls such as staggered work shifts and meal breaks that reduce the number of people present at any given time. Respiratory protection offers yet another line of defense should COVID-19 ever return in its current form, or a mutated one against which the vaccines under development will not work.

Organizations have meanwhile been compelled to make telecommuting and distance education work, which in fact eliminate the need for brick and mortar structures along with their associated capital and maintenance costs. Continuation of these approaches, therefore, offers enormous savings even when they are no longer necessary for protection against COVID-19.