Less than a year since reporting its first death, Northeast Tennessee’s novel coronavirus death toll has reached 1,000, an almost incomprehensible loss that few could have imagined when the region reported its first cases of the disease last March. That number is staggering, but it also comes at a time that deaths in the region, and the nation, have begun to slow. So, while we are seeing positive effects of the new vaccines, and a good willingness by many to accept that they work, and to take them as they become available, we still have to come to terms with the more than 1,000 people who will not be with us to celebrate the improvements.