PANDEMIC PROJECTIONS: OLD AND NEW

At the end of my May 18th post

Will the Current USA Pandemic Incidence Continue to Decline?

I presented the table below of various projections for the future based up 2%, 1.5%,1%, 0,5% and 0% declines, 

The ACTUAL CASES are given at the right. Essentially the decline was going at a rate better than 2% up until June 15th when it dramatically slowed into at first a plateau before July 4th and now an upswing. 

The upswing in yellow has already placed us where we would have been if the rate had been 0.5%. Since we are already getting up into the 30000s this week, on August 1st we will likely be at the worst case scenario, namely no decline from May 15th.  

In other words relying on the vaccine alone has not been sufficient to bring virus cases down in face of the Delta variant

 

FUTURE PANDEMIC DECLINE PROJECTIONS
Pandemic Incidence Decline Projection at Rate of						ACTUAL
Date	April 10 2%	15-May	15-May	15-May	15-May	CASES
		1.50%	1%	0.50%	0%
15-May	36090	35788	35788	35788	35788	35788
1-Jun	25599	27679	30167	32865	35788	16040
15-Jun	19293	22401	26208	30637	35788	12482
4-Jul	13143	16809	21652	27854	35788	11593
15-Jul	10524	14235	19386	26360	35788	26780
1-Aug	7465	11009	16341	24207	35788
15-Aug	5626	8910	14196	22566	35788
5-Sep	3607	6891	11380	20723	35788
15-Sep	3007	5577	10396	19319	35788
1-Oct	2221	4379	8852	17830	35788
15-Oct	1640	3544	7690	16621	35788
1-Nov	1164	2741	6482	15264	35788
15-Nov	877	2218	5631	14229	35788

 ARE WE BEGINNING A NEW SURGE?

For the last week there has been a steady rise in cases such as we see when we get a surge.  Usually I wait until two or three weeks of steady data to announce projections.  However given the magnitude of the increase this past week I thought I would let everyone in on my process.

FUTURE PANDEMIC CASE INCREASE PROJECTIONS						ACTUAL
Date	Pandemic Case Increase Rate per Day					CASES
	2%	3%	4%	5%	6%
9-Jul	20531	20531	20531	20531	20531	20531
10-Jul	20942	21147	21352	21558	21763	21382
11-Jul	21360	21781	22206	22635	23069	21305
12-Jul	21788	22435	23095	23767	24453	22731
13-Jul	22223	23108	24018	24956	25920	24202
14-Jul	22668	23801	24979	26203	27475	26720
15-Jul	23121	24515	25978	27514	29124	26780
16-Jul	23584	25251	27017	28889	30871	33994
17-Jul	24055	26008	28098	30334	32723	35275
18-Jul	24536	26788	29222	31850	34687	31512
1-Aug	32375	40520	50603	63061	78423
15-Aug	42719	61290	87628	124857	177308
Labor Day	66042	117437	207672	365240	638934

As can be seen from the above table, right now a rate of 5% per day best approximates the data so far. If that were to hold true we will be at 365,240 cases by Labor Day, far above the 250,000 cases per day at the height of the pandemic in January.

Of course the rate might stabilize at a lower rate, e.g. 4% in another week or two.

And as the rate goes up people and governments will take responses which may mitigate the rate of increase.

What seems clear from this first week of data is the Delta rate of increase will likely be greater than the original virus which always increased at the rate of 2%.

What also seems clear is that we could be overwhelmed very quickly with enormous public confusion and increased skepticism of the experts and government.  

Of course the epidemiologists have long told us that they would not have abolished mask requirements and would not be going to church, concerts and other public gatherings of vaccinated and unvaccinated people.  Essentially government has put all its eggs into the vaccine basket.  It looks like that was unwise in the case of this fast spreading Delta variant.