Renowned epidemiologist Neil Ferguson of the Imperial Collegesuggested in his model last week the U.S. and the U.K. would have tocontinue to shut down for as many as 18 months to avoid catastrophic death, but testified in front of the U.K’s Parliamentary select committee on science and technology earlier this week that he expects the country to be able to flatten the curve within 2-3 weeks.
TheImperial College predicted that over 500,000 people could die in theU.K., and over two million could die in the U.S., but Ferguson said henow expects the death toll in Britain to be under 20,000, according to NewScientist.
Former British Prime Minister Gordon Brown called for a new global government to fight the impact of the coronavirus and coordinate production and distribution of essential equipment.