In theory, a place could have a situation where the only testing was happening to confirm already symptomatic patients, so small numbers, but high fatality rate, as all the mild cases gonindetected. Then it moves, over a few weeks, to a mass testing regime, resulting in a lot more tests performed, finding a lot more cases, but the actual peak in cases/​population was a few weeks ago.
In theory, a place could have a situation where the only testing was happening to confirm already symptomatic patients, so small numbers, but high fatality rate, as all the mild cases gonindetected. Then it moves, over a few weeks, to a mass testing regime, resulting in a lot more tests performed, finding a lot more cases, but the actual peak in cases/​population was a few weeks ago.