Anthony Fauci, the president’s chief medical adviser, said yesterday that, “I would hope that that’s the case. But that would only be the case if we don’t get another variant that eludes the immune response of the prior variant.” Even then, he added, Covid-19 would likely remain part of the world as an endemic disease, meaning it will be with us like the flu and the common cold.  In the meantime, with the Omicron variant discovered in Beijing just two weeks before the opening of the Olympic games, China has shut down the sale of event tickets to the general public. They had already limited ticket sales to domestic spectators only.

  The single case of Omicron discovered in Beijing resulted in the testing of 13,000 people who might have crossed paths or had contact with the patient, who authorities said had recently been to several restaurants and malls. Beijing also decided to bar from the games anyone who has visited a Chinese city that recorded even a single case of the coronavirus in the past 14 days.

  In Greece, authorities have stepped up their fight by imposing a vaccination mandate for people 60 and older. The over-60s who fail to get vaccinated face  50-euro ($57) fine this month, followed by a monthly fine of 100 euros ($114) until they get the shot.

  Here in the US, Joint Chiefs of Staff Gen. Mark A. Milley has tested positive. He’s vaxxed and boostered, the Pentagon says.  The Marine Corps also says its top general, Commandant David Berger,is positive.

Cold Case: A six-year investigation into the betrayal of the Holocaust diarist Anne Frank has identified a surprising suspect in the betrayal of the teenager, her family, and others hidden in the annex of an Amsterdam warehouse building.

  Retired FBI agentVincent Pankoke and about 20 historians, criminologists, and data specialists, identified their suspect as Arnold van den Bergh, a fellow Jew who survived by betrayal. Van den Bergh was a businessman who acted as notary in the forced sale of art works to prominent Nazis such as Hermann Göring. 

  The conclusion of the investigation ultimately rested on an unsigned note to Anne’s father Otto, found in an old post-war file, saying Van den Bergh had access to addresses where Jews were hiding as a member of Amsterdam’s wartime Jewish Council and had passed lists of such addresses to the Nazis to save his own family. Neither he nor his daughter were deported to the death camps.

  Anne and seven other Jews were discovered on August 4 of 1944 and deported to extermination camps. She died in the Bergen Belsen camp at age 15. Her father was the only family survivor.

The Obit Page: John Connolly, The former New York police detective turned investigative journalist, who dug deep into the case of sex trafficker Jeffrey Epstein, has died at age at 78. 

  He was known for having deep contacts in Hollywood, Wall Street, politicians, police, and mobsters.

 Connolly was co-author with James Patterson of the 2017 book “Filthy Rich: The Shocking True Story of Jeffrey Epstein — The Billionaire’s Sex Scandal,” which was turned into a Netflix series.

  Connolly once said of Epstein, “Like all good grifters, he had ways of moving people in directions where they shouldn’t go … Once they did, they were screwed.”

The Spin Rack:  Britain says it has begun supplying Ukraine with anti-tank weapons to help it defend itself in the event of a Russian invasion. Canada has joined the effort on a small scale deploying a small contingent of special forces operators to Ukraine.  — Far-right French presidential candidate Éric Zemmour was found guilty of inciting racial hatred and fined $11,400. Zemmour centered around his description of unaccompanied child migrants as “thieves,” “killers” and “rapists” during a debate on the CNews TV channel in September of 2020. — Europeans for the first time bought more electric cars than diesels in December, for the first time supplanting  what was once the most popular engine option in Europe.

Snow Day: We’re keeping it short today and going skiing.