NBC Boston discussed the findings of COVID-19 Simulator with Jagpreet Chhatwal.

New England would see a spike in deaths from the novel coronavirus if social distancing measures currently in place were lifted, a new online modeling tool shows.

According to the COVID-19 Simulator developed by researchers at Massachusetts General Hospital and Georgia Tech, the total deaths from the coronavirus in the six New England states could reach some 90,000 by the end of August if all restrictions were lifted. The number of total cases in the region would balloon to nearly 6.5 million.

“Policy makers need to make decisions quickly—our analysis shows that even a week’s time can have a huge impact on the future trajectory of COVID-19. We developed the COVID-19 Simulator to inform such key decisions under this highly uncertain environment,” said lead investigator Jagpreet Chhatwal, PhD, a Senior Scientist at the MGH Institute for Technology Assessment and an Assistant Professor at Harvard Medical School.