Americans have to recalibrate our expectations about what makes a vaccine successful. The public discussion of the pandemic has become distorted by a presumption that vaccination can and should eliminate COVID-19 entirely. Under such an unattainable standard, each breakthrough infection looks like evidence that the vaccines are not working. But in reality, they continue to perform extremely well…

Unfortunately, health experts and public officials have done a poor job of explaining that while vaccines provide partial protection to individuals against infection and transmission, their most important benefit is at the population level. The more people get vaccinated, the less transmission occurs in the community, reducing everyone’s risk of infection. Over the long term, other precautions, such as better ventilation and air filtration, can reduce the risk even further. And just as face coverings became the norm for many people in East Asia after outbreaks of SARS and the avian flu, they will likely become part of America’s COVID-19 endgame too—at least during times of the year when respiratory infections are most likely to spread.

Because early data on vaccine effectiveness reinforced the perception that the vaccines could block all infections, news that they do not has unnecessarily shaken many Americans’ confidence. The goal isn’t to eliminate SARS-CoV-2 infections. We can’t, no matter how many booster shots the United States gives. The goal is to slow the spread, save lives, and eventually turn COVID-19 into something much less deadly—something more like the flu.