Deaths from COVID-19 could reach 200,000 in the United States by October, according to an epidemiological model that has been influential in policymaking.
“Increased mobility and premature relaxation of social distancing led to more infections, and we see it in Florida, Arizona, and other states. This means more projected deaths,” Ali Mokdad, one of the creators of the model, told CNN.
The model, maintained by the Institute for Health Metrics and Evaluation at the University of Washington, now projects 201,129 deaths by Oct. 1, with a range of 171,551 to 269,395.
At present, there are more than 2.1 million confirmed cases of COVID-19 in the U.S. and 118,384 confirmed deaths.
The Trump administration has relied heavily on the IHME model.
It has come under heavy criticism, though.
“It’s not a model that most of us in the infectious disease epidemiology field think is well-suited” to projecting COVID-19 deaths, epidemiologist Marc Lipsitch of the Harvard T.H. Chan School of Public Health told reporters in mid-April.
In early May, the IHME model predicted that the U.S. would reach about 73,000 deaths by August. That number was reached on May 9.
