Model predicts Bay State decline in deaths
As Southern states see spike
Massachusetts over the next month will experience a gradual decline of coronavirus deaths, while many states across the country that are seeing a surge of cases will suffer a steady increase in new deaths, an infectious disease modeler told the Herald Wednesday.
The Bay State, one of the earliest states to get hit hard by the coronavirus, has seen a steady decline in COVID19 deaths over the last two months. That downward slope will gradually continue, said Nicholas Reich, director of the UMass Influenza Forecasting Center of Excellence.
“Our model is predicting a flattening of deaths over the next four weeks,” he said of coronavirus deaths in Massachusetts.
Massachusetts’ COVID-19 death toll was 8,243 as of Wednesday. That will rise to 8,651 by the first week of August, according to the model.
While the Bay State is expected to see a decline in new deaths, “Nationwide, we are predicting that we will see the opposite,” Reich said.
“With increases in cases in a lot of places, there’s reason to think it will lead to more deaths,” said Reich, also an associate professor of biostatistics and epidemiology in the UMass Amherst School of Public Health and Health Sciences.
The model predicts 3,800 to 5,000 new coronavirus deaths nationwide each week over the next month.
The 131,000 death toll in the U.S. is expected to rise to around 147,000 deaths by Aug. 1, according to the model.
However, there is much uncertainty in the forecast, Reich noted.
“Some reasons for optimism is the younger average age of cases, protecting the most vulnerable people in the population, and maybe people picking up more mild cases,” he said. “So there’s much uncertainty on the ground right now.”
The coronavirus hot spots seeing a surge of cases include Florida, California, Texas, Arizona, South Carolina, Alabama and Louisiana.
As many states face a big spike in cases, local leaders are grappling with how to safely return to school this fall. Reich said it’s vital that “we remain really, really vigilant.”
“We need to make sure there’s a lot of testing, that results are coming back very fast, and that schools have the infrastructure in place to quarantine people and isolate people who are sick,” he said. “So we don’t let things get out of control again.”