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The United States will probably reach the figure of 100,000 killed by COVID-19 between now and June, according to several epidemiological models that do not foresee that infections will stop during the summer.
“We are going to lose 75,000, 80,000 or 100,000 people”President Donald Trump said Sunday on Fox and assured that the quarantine measures had avoided a balance of “at least” 1.5 million deaths in the country.
In reality, the estimate is surely too low, even without taking into account a second wave of infections in the United States, where a third of the world coronavirus cases have been registered.
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The White House itself predicts between 100,000 and 240,000 deaths. And an internal report by the Centers for Disease Prevention and Control (CDC), which was accessed by The New York Times, even anticipates a regrowth from mid-May, with the daily number of deaths almost doubling before June 1, it would be 3,000 dead instead of the current 1,500. The presidency reported, however, that That report had not been adopted by the government.
The United States has registered 68,000 dead since the start of the pandemic and, since the beginning of April, it detects about 30,000 new cases every day on average.
Although contagions do not pick up thanks to the confinement imposed to stop the spread of the virus, The dynamics of the epidemic make it inevitable that the number of victims continues to grow.
“My personal estimate is that we will reach 100,000 dead in early June“says Nicholas Reich, professor of biostatistics at the University of Massachusetts, whose laboratory gathered great epidemiological models from other institutions to elaborate an average trajectory. According to that forecast, the figure of 90,000 deceased will be reached before May 23.
Americans seem to have decided get confused without waiting for official directives, according to mobile phone data collected by four companies (Facebook, Google, Descartes Labs, SafeGraph) and analyzed by the IHME institute at the University of Washington.
“Mobility has started to pick up in numerous states, even before the lifting of the slogans of social distancing“Christopher Murray, the director of the IHME institute, explained this Monday.” That mobility is increasing, in the last week or the last 10 days, probably causes more infections”
The IHME, which had been criticized for its optimistic estimates, revised up its forecast of deaths from coronavirus. According to his new calculation, between now and August 4, the number of deceased will be 134,000 instead of the 72,000 previously anticipated. According to that calculation, on May 21 the 100,000 deaths from COVID-19 will be reached.
A big country
Among the nine models cited May 1 by the CDC, at least three predict that 100,000 deaths will be reached in four weeks. Few of those estimates go beyond that time frame, given the uncertainties.
Some calculations are more pessimistic, including two models from Columbia University, who anticipate that on June 1 the figure of 100,000 deaths will have been exceeded.
Epidemiologists repeat that no model can be used alone, since they all make different hypotheses.
The most difficult thing to foresee is the behavior of people in the coming months. Will they come out with masks? How many will work from home? Will “nonessential” exits to clothing stores or restaurants return to pre-pandemic levels?
“We are at a turning point, with states that reopened businesses and others that did not“adds Reich.” That adds a level of uncertainty (…) It’s about a complex system with many human behaviors that change every day”
The total numbers of infections hide great disparities in the country. Several states, including Texas, Illinois, and the capital Washington region, are replacing early outbreaks of contagion like New York and New Jersey, where new cases are already decreasing.
To show the different situations in rural and urban areas, or in the north and south of the country, Philadelphia researchers studied the pandemic in 211 counties.
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“Tomorrow’s epicenters will probably not be today’s epicenters,” says David Rubin, a professor at the University of Pennsylvania, who also works at the Philadelphia Children’s Hospital.
His team identified heat as a moderating factor of the epidemic, which might help a little“But the temperature will not save on its own,” he warns, even in Texas where restaurants and shopping malls have just reopened. “The deaths will continue”Rubin says.
