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While I don't know what IFR to use for China -- I'm not familiar enough with their vaccines nor their rate of vaccination -- remember that in general, there's one IFR for "sick people can go to the hospital" and another, much higher one for "sick people cannot go to the hospital because they are full."

The hospitals will be full, so the IFR will be at the high end of whatever we fear.

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You've got a good point there, but we also need to consider the time frame. I'm talking about the first quarter and my predictions may be way too pessimistic. Once the virus infects the urban population (~60%) it will slow down. IHME forecasts 300k deaths in Q1.

The subvariant spreading in China is Omicron BF.7 with basic reproduction number of R0>=10. That means that herd immunity will be reached at 1-1/10 = 90% of population or higher, so by the end of 2023 the death toll may indeed exceed 1 million, depending on the exact IFR which is still uncertain.

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