Yes. If 50% of the population is infected with only 1% deaths, then that would be 1.6 million deaths in the USA. Some medics are predicting 3% deaths.
So far this flu season, about 1% of people in the United States have developed symptoms severe enough to be hospitalized, which is similar to the rate last season according to data from the CDC, while the death rate from seasonal flu is typically around 0.1%" -- https://www.livescience.com/new-coro...-with-flu.html
In the study published Feb. 18 in the China CDC Weekly, researchers found a death rate from COVID-19 to be around 2.3% in mainland China, but that is in a nation of heavy smokers and heavy pollution. In Hubei Province, the epicenter of the outbreak, the death rate reached 2.9%; in other provinces of China, that rate was just 0.4%, according to the China CDC Weekly study.
In Italy the death rate for coronavirus is estimated to be over 6%, which is much higher than elsewhere, but it all depends on who gets it. I understand that there it is mainly elderly with preexisting conditions who have died.
You just watch the 'Flu is worse' lay-folks slide away as this illness gets going.
More people are dying now from seasonal flu, but.coronavirus does have a higher fatality rate so it will undoubtedly surpass the flu as it spreads. The question is by how much.