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President Trump is extending the nation’s shutdown until at least the end of April. He’s largely basing his decision on predictions from the University of Washington that even if the nation sticks to the shutdown, 83,967 Americans will likely die of coronavirus by early August. Possibly 240,000. In New York state, an estimated 15,788 could die.

Blame coronavirus for the deaths — but dithering federal health officials for the shutdown. For two decades, they ignored warnings to stockpile enough medical supplies for a pandemic. That left hospitals unable to handle the surge of coronavirus patients.

The University of Washington’s daily death toll is predicted to peak April 15, then drop off sharply by June. The graph of coming deaths looks like a steep mountain we’re about to ascend. That’s with the shutdown continuing.

You can track the same UW predictions the president is watching at covid19.healthdata.org/projections. Admittedly, projections involve guesswork, but it beats flying blind.

As for New York, the worst days are near. Deaths per day are predicted to max out on April 10, according to UW scientists; Gov. Andrew Cuomo predicts deaths peaking at the end of the month.

Despite speculation that warm temperatures tame the virus, Florida is expected to be hit with 5,568 deaths. Still, that’s less than half New York’s toll, though Florida is a more populous state. Florida’s saving grace is having enough hospital beds. When health systems are overloaded, patients have a lower chance of surviving. In Italy, more than 10 percent of coronavirus patients are dying, because the hospital system can’t handle them.

Survival is the issue, but with the shutdown, Americans are also wondering how they’ll survive layoffs and business failures. Poverty kills, too. People legitimately ask why we should close the economy for coronavirus, when seasonal flu kills 80,000 Americans in a bad year, and the country doesn’t close for that.

Here are reasons: The coronavirus is forecast to kill more than 80,000 Americans even with the draconian shutdown. Without it, the death toll could reach the millions, according to some experts.

That horrifying forecast assumes a mortality rate of 1 percent, 10 times the flu’s death rate. But that’s increasingly doubtful. New research in the medical journal Lancet Infectious Diseases indicates a death rate of 0.66 percent.

Still, the undeniable reason coronavirus is a bigger threat than flu is its suddenness and how it sucks up health care resources. Flu patients trickle into the hospital during nearly half the year. Coronavirus patients are flooding hospitals in a compressed time frame.

And once hospitalized, they stay a longer time. The shutdown is intended to “flatten the curve,” easing demand on our shamefully understocked health system.

For two decades, government experts warned Congress and federal officials about inadequate supplies of masks and ventilators. Ten federal reports sounded that alarm, even as the nation witnessed SARS, MERS, avian flu and swine flu circle the globe. Health officials failed to act.

When Ebola threatened several years ago, hospitals again complained they lacked personal protective equipment. The feds spent nearly $5 billion to fight the disease, but nearly all of it overseas.

Even afterward, the Department of Health and Human Services’ annual budget requests for the Strategic National Stockpile were far too low to buy both medications and personal protective equipment, explains the stockpile’s former director, Greg Burel, who retired in January.

HHS requested a mere $595 million to $705 million a year. That’s less than 3 percent of the $16 billion Congress allocated to the stockpile in the legislation enacted last week.

The lack of masks robbed the United States of the option of asking the public to wear them, though research indicates widespread use can curb infectious disease spread.

Once hospitals are stocked and masks are available, the shutdown should be relaxed.

Preparedness is the lesson for surviving the next pandemic, or the return of coronavirus in the fall without a shutdown. Thanks to American ingenuity and impressive mobilization of the private sector, we will likely have tests, drugs and a vaccine near completion. But most important, we’ll have lifesaving medical equipment ready to go.

Betsy McCaughey, a former lieutenant governor of New York, is chairwoman of the Committee to Reduce Infection Deaths.