COVID-19 hospitalizations and deaths will remain stable through late July, while cases will continue to rise as the highly transmissible omicron subvariant BA.5 spreads nationwide, according to the CDC's latest disease forecasting models.
Three forecasts to know:
Cases: Daily COVID-19 cases are projected to increase 28.7 percent in the next two weeks, a lower rate of increase than projected last week, according to modeling from Mayo Clinic. Forecasts suggest daily average cases will jump from 80,830.6 cases on July 7 to 104,051 by July 21. During the omicron surge, this figure hit a peak of more than 800,000, according to data tracked by The New York Times.
The nation's case rate is also expected to increase from 31.5 cases per 100,000 population to 31.7 over the same period.
Hospitalizations: Nationwide, daily COVID-19 hospital admissions are projected to remain stable or have an uncertain trend over the next four weeks, with 2,000 to 13,400 new admissions likely reported on July 29, according to the CDC's ensemble forecast from 13 modeling groups.
Although COVID-19 hospitalizations have been rising since mid-April, the nation's current seven-day average (37,472) is still far lower than the more than 150,000 seven-day average seen at the height of the omicron surge, according to data tracked by the Times.
Deaths: COVID-19 deaths are also projected to remain stable or have an uncertain trend over the next month, according to the CDC's ensemble forecast from 16 modeling groups. The forecast projects 1,400 to 4,900 deaths likely reported in the week ending July 30, which translates to a daily total of 200 to 700 deaths.
The nation's current seven-day daily death average was 322 as of July 10, down 7 percent in the last two weeks, according to data from the Times.
The CDC said its ensemble forecasts are among the most reliable for COVID-19 modeling, but they cannot predict rapid changes in hospitalizations or deaths. Therefore, they should not be relied on "for making decisions about the possibility or timing of rapid changes in trends," the agency said.
Note: Mayo Clinic uses a Bayesian statistical model to forecast cases that automatically updates as new data becomes available. There is an uncertainty interval for forecast values, with lower and upper bounds that are not included in this list. To learn more about the data Mayo Clinic uses to forecast hot spots, click here. Becker's pulled the forecast values July 11 at 8:50 a.m. CDT.