I think one of the biggest problems is that people suffer from COVID behind the walls of the hospital. People really need to see things with their own eyes to be emotionally affected by it, and most people have never seen a dying COVID patient with their own eyes.

Put these people inside the hospital for a single day and their opinions would dramatically shift. "Oh! It's actually real!" They would realise.

When people hear "674,000 people have died from COVID in USA", it doesn't emotionally effect them, and they continue to think COVID is no big deal. Put them in-front of a single dying COVID patient, and their feelings would change.

That's just how human psychology works.