Pandemic Epidemic Collaborative  4-Week Forecast – General Commentary – “We are in the 8th U.S. COVID wave and 2nd biggest all-time, barring any atypical downward corrections of wastewater levels. We have surpassed the best estimates of the initial COVID wave, the first winter, the Delta wave, and the most recent late-summer wave. Any claims that the “pandemic is over” or “COVID is over” run contrary to stated evidence, will inflict much harm, and should be labeled misinformation. U.S. wastewater levels indicate that COVID transmission is higher than during 94.7% of the days of the pandemic and lower than during 5.3% of the days of the pandemic.

• 3.46% (1 in 29) are infectious
• 1.6 million COVID cases/day
• 80,000 Long Covid cases/day

Weekly new cases stand at 11.6 million. Weekly long COVID cases resulting from these infections stand at >0.5 million. Nearly 1 in 3 Americans will get infected during the peak 2 months of this winter surge. That’s 105 million infections total. Over half of infections will occur after the peak, which is why it remains important to encourage vaccination among people who are delayed.”