Weekly Update on COVID-19 Forecast Hub’s Cumulative U.S. Death Predictions

Topic:         Weekly update on COVID-19 Forecast Hub’s cumulative U.S. death predictions

Expert:       Nicholas Reich, director of the UMass Influenza Forecasting Center of Excellence
                   and associate professor of biostatistics and epidemiology
                   in the School of Public Health and Health Sciences

Available:  Via phone, email and web video conferencing

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Nicholas Reich, director of the UMass Influenza Forecasting Center of Excellence  and associate professor of biostatistics and epidemiology in the School of Public Health and Health Sciences, is available to discuss the updated projections, four weeks out, for number of COVID-19 deaths nationally and by state.

The new forecast for cumulative U.S. deaths by June 6 is 112,647, with a 10% chance of seeing fewer than 104,167 and a 10% chance of seeing more than 123,272. Interactive visualizations also show the breakdown of projected deaths by state: https://reichlab.io/covid19-forecast-hub/

The COVID-19 forecast hub, curated by Reich and his team, now represents 36 models (up from 20 last week) from 20 teams (up from 15 last week) of highly respected infectious-disease forecasters from prominent institutions. In addition to gathering models to make easy side-by-side comparisons of different forecasts, Reich’s team has implemented an “ensemble” forecast that offers a more accurate picture of the future than any single model can project.

Reich says: “The ensemble model is now 85-90% certain that we will reach 100,000 deaths in the U.S. by May 30. This represents a slight increase and tightening in certainty compared with what the forecast said last week.

“We continue to see increasing consensus among the models, which are showing similar upward trends, but there is still quite a bit of uncertainty about what will happen four weeks from now. Among seven models, the spread of best-guess predictions for deaths in the U.S. by early June ranges from around 103,000 to 120,000. This range covers 17,000 deaths, which is still sometimes more than the number of people who die in a flu season. Two weeks ago, the spread between models was almost twice as high, around 35,000.”

For more information, follow Reich on Twitter @reichlab