Allison Arwady has been the face of COVID-19 in Chicago. Will Mayor-elect Brandon Johnson keep her on?

Sitting at a table flanked by the Chicago and United States flags — like she has countless times over the past three years — Dr. Allison Arwady gave her weekly online address and took viewers’ questions about COVID-19, just days before the nation’s public health emergency came to an end Thursday.

Mayor Lori Lightfoot joined the public health commissioner to reflect on the city’s battle with COVID-19 and reiterate the need to continue getting vaccinated. It marked a double conclusion, both of the official pandemic emergency and of Lightfoot’s term in office, which ends Monday.

And Arwady, more than anyone except possibly Lightfoot herself, has been the face of COVID-19 in Chicago since the very beginning, when one of the first cases in Illinois was diagnosed in a Chicago school aide in March 2020.

Within weeks, schools, offices, restaurants and businesses would all be shut down, and it wouldn’t be much longer before Arwady became a household — or, rather, housebound — name. In news conferences, held daily at first, it was Arwady who tried to explain the science and the data behind an ever-changing set of rules and restrictions over masking, testing, vaccine mandates, social distancing and capacity limits.

Most controversially, she was thrust into bitter battles over in-person learning — getting heat both from those who wanted schools to reopen sooner and also from the Chicago Teachers Union, which successfully fought to delay the return by twice refusing to teach in person.

And unlike other local agency heads who left their jobs during the pandemic, like Chicago Public Schools CEO Janice Jackson, Arwady has stayed until the end. On Thursday afternoon, Arwady told WGN-AM’s Lisa Dent about a meeting that she said took place Monday with the mayor-elect.

“He and his team have asked me to stay on, at least initially, while our teams get to know each other,” Arwady said. “I also want to have the opportunity to get to know him and his team. So I am coming to work on Monday and excited to really be able to work with a new administration.”

What’s less clear is how long Mayor-elect Brandon Johnson will retain her.

Asked about Arwady in March, at a debate during the mayoral campaign, Johnson, a former teacher and CTU organizer, said he and Arwady “have different views of public health, and so, no, she will not stay on in my administration.”

Since he won the race — beating Lightfoot in the first round and then former CPS CEO Paul Vallas in the runoff — Johnson has been more circumspect. Before Arwady’s WGN interview, a Johnson spokesman had declined to comment Monday on Arwady’s future in the new administration, saying, “We’re having conversations with all city departments and sister agencies about our vision for the future and will continue to do so.”

Johnson’s spokesperson did not immediately respond to a request for comment on Arwady’s recent interview.

At her regular Facebook Live session this week, the Ivy League-educated Arwady assured listeners that she intends to continue to educate the public on Chicago’s COVID-19 response. Arwady’s salary is about $197,000 for the job she took over in January 2020, the same month the first COVID-19 cases were detected in the U.S.

“This is not my last broadcast. We may not have a Facebook Live next week, there’s a lot going on next week,” she said. “But no, this is not my last Facebook Live.”

While the future for both Lightfoot and Arwady remains uncertain, the two spent much of their joint appearance reflecting on the past several years.

“It was like watching a sci-fi movie, where this contagion was spreading from China, throughout Asia, jumping to Europe, parts of Africa,” Lightfoot said. “And then it came to the United States and started on our coast, and you just knew it’s coming to Chicago.”

COVID-19 has killed more than 8,000 Chicagoans, according to city data. While the pandemic emergency is officially over and cases are substantially down, Lightfoot said that the virus is still very much a part of everyday life.

“My instinct tells me that COVID is going to be with us for quite some time, maybe the rest of our lives,” Lightfoot said. “And that means just like flu, we’re going to need to get an annual booster, at least an annual booster.”

Arwady agreed before pulling up photos that reminded the viewers of the dire situation in the past few years including a shot of the United Center transformed into a makeshift wartime-like hospital.

“Oh my goodness, times I never ever want to go back to,” Arwady said. “We didn’t know where things were heading. So much we didn’t know.”

Arwardy also spoke about the end of the public health emergency means. While vaccines will continue to be free for the foreseeable future, there will be some other changes.

“As of Thursday, insurance companies will no longer be required to pay for at-home tests, though some may choose to continue them,” she said. “It’s a good opportunity to order your free ones from the federal government, just be a little bit stockpiled if you can.”

There will also be some changes to health care including COVID-19 treatments which will no longer be universally free depending on insurance status. Medicaid users must reconfirm eligibility.

But some things don’t change, she continued.

“As the emergency ends, it is important that people hear it doesn’t mean I stop staying home if I have a positive COVID test,” Arwady said. “It doesn’t mean I stopped taking a test if I have COVID symptoms, it doesn’t mean I never put a mask on, please.”

There are still a lot of questions about COVID-19 and what happens next. But the message of the change was overall positive without promising that the city was in the clear.

“We are not considering COVID over in Chicago, but we are at a different point in terms of risk,” she said. “Congrats on the end of the public health emergency.”