First of all, at this point in the pandemic, using the number of new cases as a measure of severity is not helpful. As you can see in Europe, while cases are higher than they were several months ago, deaths are way, way down. Also, as you can see, there is a negligible number of COVID patients in Austin hospitals. For whatever reason, getting COVID now is not nearly as harmful as it was back in April. To continue to look at case numbers the same way is either naive or intentionally manipulative. Either way, it is harmful to the general public.

Second, your statement that the virus is suppressed because people are wearing masks is not only unsubstantiated, but the implication you are making is logically flawed. With this logic, you could justify the continuation of a mask mandate indefinitely. Indeed, even if there were 0 new cases of COVID for an entire week, the exact same logic could reasonably be applied: there are no cases because people are wearing masks. Therefore the mandate must remain.

Anyway, I agree with the above. We have to actually try to get back to normal if we ever want to. Inevitably this will lead to an increase in cases, and yes deaths, but on balance, the net benefit to society will be positive. And when making policy decisions, the net good must be determinative.