Why is there mistrust of the covid-19 vaccine?
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(CNN) -
The number of coronavirus cases in the United States could reach 20 million by Presidential Inauguration Day, Jan.20, according to a new forecast on the coronavirus pandemic from Washington University in St. Louis.
The model, published Monday in the journal Nature Scientific Reports, looks at coronavirus case numbers and mobility data.
"We forecast rates of new covid-19 cases under different social distancing norms and found that if social distancing is eliminated, there will be a massive increase in covid-19 cases," the team wrote.
The model projected that if current measures of social distancing return to normal by 60% compared to pre-pandemic levels, the U.S. is likely to reach 20 million cases by the end of January.
The importance of social distancing
Increased social distancing efforts could further reduce the number of new cases, although efforts vary widely across the country, the researchers noted.
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"Even small increases in social distancing can have a big effect on the number of cases we see in the next two and a half months," model co-developer Raphael Thomadsen said in a statement.
“Returning to a 50% return to normal, which was the average level of distancing in early August, would likely result in 5 million fewer cases by the end of January.
If the US were to return to the level of social distancing in April, Thomadsen predicted that the spread of COVID-19 could be "effectively squashed."
But this is probably a conservative estimate, the team said, because their model assumes that only 10% of coronavirus cases are ever diagnosed.
"More recently, however, testing has increased and probably more than 25% of cases are diagnosed," model co-developer Song Yao said in a statement.
"In that case, total covid cases would increase beyond 20 million in the coming months, unless we as a society engage in further social distancing."
The researchers also predicted that the Christmas season will create "a lot of uncertainty" in the model because people will travel more at the end of the year.
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