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LOS ANGELES, CA – MARCH 5: Rev. Dr. Frederick Price’s coffin is set to leave at the conclusion of the final public display on March 5, 2021 in Los Angeles, California. A public exhibition was held in honor of Rev. Dr. Price, founder of the Crenshaw Christian Center, who died on February 12 of complications from COVID-19. (Photo by Brandon Bell / Getty Images)
Covid-19’s numbers may be declining in the United States after a year of collective mourning. But with tens of thousands of deaths expected in the coming months, experts are warning Americans not to let their guard down yet.
“I think we will be deceived,” said Dr. Paul Offit, director of the Vaccine Education Center at Children’s Hospital in Philadelphia, on Thursday. “I think what will happen is that you will see that, as we enter the summer months, the numbers will drop, people will think very well, we are fine.”
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Christy Hylton, vice president of the church council is preparing to place a paper heart at the United Church of Christ in Kenhorst, Pennsylvania, to represent every 1,000 Covid-19 deaths in the state on March 3, 2021.
He added: “And then, if we don’t get to what I think will be at least 80% of the population’s immunity against natural infections or immunization, when winter comes, you will see a sudden increase again.”
In the past seven days, the US has registered an average of 56,240 new cases per day – the lowest since mid-October – and 1,437 deaths per day, which is the lowest level the country has seen since November 19.
And vaccinations are accelerating. As of Friday, more than 101 million doses have been administered in the U.S., according to data from the U.S. Center for Disease Control and Prevention. More than 10% of the US population has been fully vaccinated, according to the CDC, and almost 20% have already received at least one dose.
But if the policies continue as they are now, some 23,000 people could die from the virus by April, according to a projection by the Institute for Health Metrics and Evaluation.
Still, many states have begun to relax measures, including masking mandates. And because of fewer masks and more people moving with more communicable variants, IHME increased its forecast of Covid-19 deaths on July 1 by an additional 22,000 people.
Overall, the IHME predicts almost 600,000 deaths from Covid-19 by July 1, up from the current number of about 530,000 reported deaths.
What the United States will do next could impact the path of the pandemic, Rochelle Walensky, director of the US Center for Disease Control and Prevention, said in an interview with NBC Nightly News.
“I think March and April are such important and critical times,” she said. “On the one hand, you have this hyper-transmissible virus that can result in another outbreak after spring break.
“On the other hand, we are increasing vaccinations very quickly, and what we really want is to give these vaccines a chance to overcome and not allow the virus to grow again.”
‘We have to be humble with this virus’
For those who are vaccinated, the CDC released new guidelines on Monday, maintaining travel recommendations for those who have been vaccinated.
Some questioned whether the guidelines are too strict.
“We have to be humble with this virus,” said Walensky in an interview with NBC Nightly News. “Every time we felt that everything was under control, we had a huge increase.”
Once more people are vaccinated and the number of cases decreases, the CDC can revise its guidelines, said Walensky.
A year after much of the country was paralyzed by the virus, more than 98 million doses of Covid-19 vaccines were administered in the United States, according to CDC data published on Thursday.
About 1 in 10 people in the United States – about 33.9 million people – are fully vaccinated and about 1 in 5 people – more than 64 million – received a dose.
In a speech on Thursday, President Joe Biden promised that vaccine nominations would be open to all US adults by May 1, and by July 4 the US could be celebrating its independence from the pandemic.
“If July 4th arrives and your family has been vaccinated and your neighbors on the street have been vaccinated, yes, you can absolutely get together for a barbecue,” said Dr. Jonathan Reiner to Don Lemon of CNN on Thursday .
“Getting shot in the arm is not just a ticket for vaccination, it is a ticket to take people back to offices, to open movie theaters, to fill stadiums, to put people back on airplanes,” he said .
Turning attention to ‘long Covid’
But even if the spread of the virus is controlled in the United States in the coming months, the nation will still be struggling with the survivors of Covid-19 who suffer the effects of the disease long after they have been infected, said Dr. Ashish Jha, dean of the the Brown University School of Public Health.
“We know that 525,000 of our American compatriots have died, but we also know that tens of millions have been infected, have not luckily died, and have recovered. But I want to know what the long-term effects are for these individuals,” Jha told Erin Burnett from CNN.
“I worry that we are really just seeing the tip of the iceberg when we think of Covid Long, that there will be a lot of disabilities, a lot of suffering that will be with us for a long time,” said Jha. “I hope this is not true. But that is what I care about and I would like to understand it better.”
A recent study found that 30% of people with Covid-19 continue to experience symptoms up to nine months after the initial infection, and the National Institutes of Health has launched a $ 1 billion research effort to study the long-term health effects .
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