Rural Covid-19 death rate grew by 1/3 last week, highest since March and 117% higher than urban rate; infections up

NEW CORONAVIRUS INFECTIONS, in ranges by county, Sept. 12-18
Daily Yonder map; click the image to enlarge it or click here for the interactive version.

During the week of Sept. 12-18, rural counties reported 2,906 more deaths from Covid-19, nearly one-third higher than the 2,210 deaths recorded two weeks ago, and the most since early March. That's according to an analysis by The Daily Yonder of USA Facts reports. But, since Florida deaths have not been recorded in the USA Facts reports for the past two weeks, the real death rate is likely even higher. "A crosscheck with data from the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention shows that Florida had about 2,500 Covid-related deaths each of the last two weeks, meaning the actual death rates are potentially 20 percent higher than the USA Facts data," the Yonder's Tim Murphy and Tim Marema report.

New rural infections rose by 5% last week, compared to a 3% fall in the metro rate. The rural infection rate is about 60% higher than the metro rate. "A third of rural counties have rates of more than 500 new cases per 100,000 for the week – or five times the red-zone threshold," Murphy and Marema report. "Only about a fifth of metropolitan counties have new-infection rates that high."

Among the 100 counties with the highest new infection rates last week, 83 were rural, and 29 states had all their rural counties in the red zone, meaning there were at least 100 new daily cases per 100,000 residents over a week's time. Only four states had fewer than 90% of their counties in the red zone: Alaska, New Mexico, South Dakota and Utah.

Click here for an interactive county-level map, regional analysis and charts from the Yonder.