Omicron is running out of unvaxxed people without previous infections.
The rate will continue to fall quickly, and we'll never see COVID-19 death rates this high again. More than 90% of the deaths this wave would have been prevented if everyone had been vaccinated.
Death reports trail infections by about a month, so opening up entirely won't affect the death curve until mid March, by which point it will be much, much lower...and it will just cause the tail to trend down a bit slower after that point.
BA.2 version of Omicron seems similar except for a significantly faster viral ramp / shorter serial interval; that's probably how it's spreading faster. But Omicron original and vaxxes should still give good protection.
In people who are vaxxed or previously infected, Omicron is much, much less dangerous than in naïve subjects. I suspect any seasonal COVID pattern in the future to run mostly like a nasty flu season. I'll probably mask up and skip big crowds during those surges, but ignore it otherwise. (While staying up to date with boosters or variant vaxxes.)
