A sobering report from Imperial College London is believed to have elevated the federal government’s response to the coronavirus crisis.
The report said the pandemic could kill more than 1 million Americans. And that’s even if the sick get isolated, people are home-quarantined, and seniors practice social distancing.
The study is based on a roughly 1 percent death rate from COVID-19, said Dr Chris Salvino, a trauma surgeon who works in western Arizona.
“And China was actually a little bit higher,” he said.
Still, Salvino said the U.S. death rate could end up lower than the study projects. Summer is coming.
“Which may in itself reduce a respiratory virus. It typically does for influenza,” he said.
Plus we don’t even know how many people in the U.S. have the coronavirus right now, he said.
But what if the study is right?
“The coronavirus is probably 10 times more deadly than influenza,” he said.
Salvino said without a vaccine, prevention is the best weapon against the coronavirus, and it starts with individual choices to follow expert advice.
