Health

EL PASO, Texas -- El Pasoans may not fully grasp how bad things are going to get over the next month. Sixty-eight cases, the total number of cases reported in El Paso as of Wednesday night, is a small number, after all. But that number is going to grow rapidly.

Bob Moore of El Paso Matters looked at the doubling rate of coronavirus infections in El Paso since the first case was reported on March 13. It has taken two to five days for each doubling of the number of confirmed cases, which is how El Paso went from 1 to 68 cases in 19 days. Epidemics and pandemics grow exponentially.

If El Paso’s infections double every 4 days

The last doubling was on Tuesday, when El Paso reached 50 cases. Using that as a base, with a four-day doubling rate, means by Saturday El Paso could be at 100 cases. El Paso seems well on its way to that number with Wednesday night’s 18 new confirmed cases.

What happens over the next month? The chart below tells that story. If the number of confirmed Covid-19 cases doubles every four days, El Paso will have reached 12,800 cases by May 2. Many will have required hospitalization, including some needing intensive care, and some will have died.

If El Paso’s infections double every 3 days

Moore also looked at what happens with a three-day doubling rate, which is the mid-range of what El Paso's seen so far.

A three-day doubling rate means that El Paso would be at 100 cases on Friday. Think that’s unlikely? That would require an added 32 cases Thursday and Friday, which would be a 47 percent two-day increase in the total number of cases. El Paso just had a 36 percent one-day increase on Wednesday.

So if El Paso is at 100 cases on Friday and that doubles every three days, the chart below is what the next month looks like.

Doubling the number of coronavirus-caused infections every three days would mean that more than 100,000 El Pasoans — one in every eight — would have contracted the virus within six weeks of the first confirmed case in our community.

Moore believes that the first scenario of doubling every four days is more likely. And it’s certainly possible that the city/county restrictions in place since March 24 could flatten the curve and slow the doubling rate, but that won’t be known for at least two weeks.

Under any likely scenario, caseloads in the thousands could occur by the end of this month. And it's almost a certainty that some El Pasoans will die.