A key coronavirus model often cited by the White House has revised its death projection for the United States slightly downward, now predicting that 143,360 people will die by August 4.
That’s about 3,700 fewer deaths than the model predicted when last updated on May 12.
The shift is small, but it marks a departure from recent increases in the model’s death projections, which have been largely based on increases in mobility across the country and the easing of social distancing measures.
As people have been moving around more — and as social distancing measures have been relaxed — the model has projected more deaths.
But in today’s release, researchers at the Institute for Health Metrics and Evaluation at the University of Washington, who built the model, say that fewer people are forecast to die in certain parts of the country.
That suggests that expected increases in coronavirus cases may not have materialized yet in certain places — at least not to the extent that the model was projecting.
