A startling new projection suggests that coronavirus cases and deaths in the US could return to levels last seen during the January peak, as the Delta variant first identified in India fuels a massive surge in infections.
As of Saturday, the seven-day rolling average of daily new cases was nearly 50,000, a 166 percent increase from two weeks ago, according to a DailyMail.com analysis of Johns Hopkins data. Meanwhile vaccination rates are plateauing, with just 57 percent of the eligible population fully vaccinated.
It's a dangerous combination that could be leading the nation toward a new phase of disaster, according to projections released this week by the COVID-19 Scenario Modeling Hub.
'What's going on in the country with the virus is matching our most pessimistic scenarios,' Justin Lessler, an epidemiologist at the University of North Carolina who helps run the modeling hub, told NPR. 'I think it's a big call for caution.'
The group combines 10 mathematical models from various academic teams to create an 'ensemble' projection, and maps out four different scenarios with variables for vaccination rates and Delta's transmissibility.
Lesser considers 'Scenario D' to be the most likely. It is the worst-case scenario, projecting that vaccination rates top out at 70 percent, and that the Delta variant is at least 60 percent more contagious than the UK Alpha variant.
Scenario D projects a new peak in cases and deaths in mid-October with the most likely case showing around 60,000 cases and 850 deaths each day. At the worst-case end of Scenario D, daily cases hit 240,000 and deaths top 4,000 per day, which would be nearly as bad as the pandemic records set in January.
Scenario D from the the COVID-19 Scenario Modeling Hub is now considered the most likely. At the high end, the model projects up to 240,000 daily cases and 4,000 daily deaths by mid-October
The model combines 10 mathematical models (above) from various academic teams to create an 'ensemble' projection
Meanwhile, troubling data from the CDC shows that Delta is spreading faster than prior models suggested, and now accounts for 82 percent of all new cases across the country.
'Where we are right now is a very different place from where we were a year ago,' Anne Rimoin, a professor of epidemiology at UCLA, told MSNBC.
'It's like when you are playing a video game and you get to the next level, and all of a sudden you are playing against an opponent that is much more difficult to play against,' she said.
'This variant, the Delta variant, is 200 times more contagious than the original variant, so when you come in contact with this variant it's much more dangerous,' added Rimoin.
It's unclear where Rimoin came up with the statistic she claimed, but some reports have suggested that Delta is 200 percent more transmissible than the strain first identified in China, which would make it three times as transmissible, not 200 times.
Even as cases surge, some states are scaling back on their reporting of new cases and deaths to once a week, making it harder to track the situation on the ground.
Florida, Nebraska, Iowa and South Dakota are all now reporting once a week, and the 73,000 new cases that Florida disclosed on Friday caused the daily figure to more than double from the day before, to 118,791.
Florida now accounts for a fifth of all new cases in the US, and the lack of data for six days out of the week is confounding efforts to accurately understand how quickly the virus is spreading.
Florida Gov. Ron DeSantis is seen in a file photo. Florida now accounts for a fifth of all new cases in the US but is only reported new cases once a week, confounding efforts to understand how quickly the virus is spreading
Anne Rimoin, a professor of epidemiology at UCLA, claimed Delta is '200 times' more contagious than the original strain. It appears she may have meant to say 200% more contagious
The Delta variant, seen in dark orange above, now accounts for 82% of all new cases in the US, according to the CDC
A regional map shows the prevalence of Delta (dark orange) as a percentage of all new cases in the area
Further complicating matters as the virus surges, vaccination rates appear to be at or near a plateau, leaving a large population unprotected and allowing Delta to
