According to researchers at the Harvard School of Public Health, the United States may need to tolerate the social distancing adopted by 2022 during a coronavirus outbreak.

More than 2,200 people died of the outbreak in the United States on Tuesday, according to the study, a record that, according to a Reuters tally, even debated how the country would reopen its economy. The total number of virus deaths in the US is more than 28,300 as of Tuesday.

Harvard researchers said in the findings published in the journal Science on Tuesday, “Intermittent disturbances may be needed in 2022 unless there is a substantial increase in critical care capacity or treatment or vaccine is available”.

Giving the example of South Korea and Singapore, the researchers wrote that effective disturbances can reduce stress on health care systems and enable contact tracing and quarantine to be possible.

The study acknowledged that economic, social and educational outcomes would most likely be negative by staying away for long periods of time.

The study notes that even in the case of “apparent elimination”, SARS-CoV-2 surveillance should still be maintained, as regrowth in fingering may be possible as late as 2024.

The World Health Organization (WHO) has warned that the infection was “certainly” not at its peak yet. Globally, about 2 million people have been infected and the most severe pandemic in more than a century has killed more than 124,000 people.

The epicenter has migrated from China, where the virus emerged in December, to the United States, which has now recorded the most deaths.