Instead of THE GUBBMINT being evil by LOCKING EVERYTHING DOWN in some scary QUARANTINE ZONE or the like, imagine a "got to build up zombie bite immunity" response, or one with pseudoscientific treatments, or pretty much anything so 
can feel like things are back to normal while zombies are just a thing that continues happening.
Add your own ideas if you like. 
Holy shit, I just had a thought about this a couple days ago. I'm imagining a world where the zombie virus played out like COVID where it came out of China, but they got their shit together and only had like 50,000 deaths. Meanwhile in the United States, chuds are holding parties in their backyards out of spite where they all start biting each other because the government told them not to. By the start of June, Minneapolis looks the same as it did IRL, but for a totally different reason and by August the United States and Canada are completely destroyed