Omicron wave, twice as deadly in unvaccinated people as its predecessors, hit rural areas harder, killing many people

The omicron variant of the coronavirus, which cause a wave of the Covid-19 infections in late 2021 and early 2022, "spread like a grass fire in America’s densely populated cities, but led to higher rates of death in rural counties where vaccinations are lagging," reports the University of Cincinnati, home to one researcher in a group who recently published a study on the phenomenon.

Their report, in the journal Frontiers in Medicine, "revealed striking disparities in health care between urban and rural America," Michael Miller writes for the university. Researchers "found that counties with vaccination rates of less than 40% had far higher mortality rates than counties with vaccination rates of 60% or more. The study recommended that health policymakers continue to make vaccination coverage a priority."

Looking forward, rural counties "face a higher probability of developing chronic illness from long Covid," said study co-author Claudia Moreno of the University of Washington. She also voiced concern that health officials are less able to track Covid-19 infections because fewer people are reporting new cases: "In the early part of the pandemic, people knew exactly what the infection rates in their counties were day to day—like the weather. And now we have peaks in case loads that are so much higher, but there is less public awareness."