These IHME predictions are actually based on deaths, not on tests. Also, please look at the wide error bars on the original data source: https://covid19.healthdata.org/projections
Of course there are still a lot of variables - one of the better criticisms is that it assumes that states lock down with the same strength, just at different dates. But it's the presentation of this Axios piece that is dangerous here: It strips out all the uncertainty estimates and presents exact numbers as if they were precise.
Go look at https://nextstrain.org/ncov if you want to see all of the mutation paths! Wonderful site/org with contributors doing great work around the globe sending in sequences.
This is not a fully correct conclusion. I feel a need to call out the conflation of "non-hierarchical" with "structurelessness"/"without a formal structure".
There are at least 3 things that the typical org hierarchy provides:
1. The dominance hierarchy, the power structure that says who can give orders to (and/or fire people for refusal to comply with orders) whom.
2. Decision-making governance. There has to be a way to get decisions made, including what people work on.
3. Conflict resolution. How does conflict get managed and escalated.
It is not true that the necessary opposite of hierarchy is anarchy - you can't just destroy the org chart and expect nothing to replace it. The org chart typically provides all 3, but the proponents of flat/innovative org structures are usually trying to dismantle just #1 the dominance hierarchy. I totally agree that it "doesn't work" if replacements for #2 and #3 aren't implemented at the same time. Approaches like Holacracy/Sociocracy are actually quite structured! They attempt to make decision-making and conflict-resolution explicit and effective, even while trying to remove the "violence inherent in the system" of bosses/bossing.
Of course there are still a lot of variables - one of the better criticisms is that it assumes that states lock down with the same strength, just at different dates. But it's the presentation of this Axios piece that is dangerous here: It strips out all the uncertainty estimates and presents exact numbers as if they were precise.