From the outset many experts urged caution, that in the short history of these marvels of medicine it had been a drawn-out journey, taking years of the finest research.

Even then, as with the human immunodeficiency virus or HIV, a vaccine can remain out of reach.

IN OTHER NEWS:

And so it has been easy for this almost-miracle of a COVID-19 vaccine to get lost in the bar-room brawl the pandemic has now become.

We have had to suffer those frightening scenes on the streets of Melbourne, where a rabble of the anti-vaxx brigade and assorted ignorant clowns and extremists have taken the me-generation concept to an altogether new level.

But as much as those protests left a shockingly bad taste in our mouths, this drawn-out world of lockdowns and business shutdowns and border closures has created enormous strain.

RELATED: Checkpoints being removed from the NSW-Victorian border

We can feel grateful to have escaped the worst of the lockdowns, especially in Albury, but that does not negate the stress created by state government-imposed border closures.

These have varied in extremity depending on whether it was NSW (well, Sydney) or Victoria (ditto, for Melbourne) experiencing a COVID-19 outbreak.

Those few months on the Border in mid-2020 certainly were our toughest, exacerbated by the knowledge we were being unfairly punished for something not even in our midsts.

The rush to put up the shutters has been replaced this year with a leaning towards greater flexibility, though what transpired still prevented many people from being able to carry out their daily lives.

The Delta variant's rapid spread in Melbourne and Sydney though has now rendered the border closure-approach obsolete.

What lies ahead, as government "road maps" are enacted, could be even tougher.

Our vaccination rates might be encroaching on almost-perfect scores but the pandemic won't stop trying to cut its deadly swathe.

That's something we are going to have to accept as, tragically, many will still die from the scourge of COVID-19.

OUR SAY - PANDEMIC AND THE BORDER

Our journalists work hard to provide local, up-to-date news to the community. This is how you can continue to access our trusted content: