[FairmontGS]

How deadly will China’s covid surge get?

Airfinity, a company based in the United Kingdom that analyzes data in the life sciences for its clients, has projected 1.7 million deaths by April.

“That’s 1.7 million within the space of 4 months,” said Louise Blair, who heads the company’s epidemiology team, emphasizing the “very steep growth” of cases. The company’s modeling relies heavily on the example of Hong Kong, which had a rapid explosion of illness and death in early 2022 when the omicron variant arrived. Hong Kong, which had low vaccination rates, had maintained a zero-covid policy that mirrored that of the mainland but was unable to contain omicron’s spread.

The Institute for Health Metrics and Evaluation (IHME) at the University of Washington has modeled the outbreak and forecasts 300,000 deaths by April 1, and 1.25 million by the end of the year — or as many as 1.6 million if there are no more mandates and restrictions, said institute epidemiologist Ali Mokdad.

https://www.washingtonpost.com/scien...rus-evolution/