The Heritage Foundation
With many state and local governments starting to relax stay-at-home orders, it’s instructive to examine just how concentrated the spread of COVID-19 has been in the U.S.
Although all U.S. states have reported cases of COVID-19, the distribution of the cases and deaths has remained heavily concentrated in a small number of states, and among a small number of counties within all states.
For instance, as of May 4, just 10 states account for 70% of all U.S. cases and 77% of all deaths. Together, New York and New Jersey alone account for 38% of all cases and 48% of total COVID-19 deaths.
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Just five states—New York, New Jersey, Massachusetts, Illinois, and California—account for 54% of all of the confirmed cases in the U.S. and 61% of all coronavirus deaths.
These state-level figures do not, however, adequately describe the concentrated nature of the spread of COVID-19.
As the first chart shows, the 30 counties with the most COVID-19 cases account for 50% of all the cases in the U.S. (and 57% of all deaths). That is, just 1% of the counties in the U.S. are responsible for half of the country’s coronavirus cases and more than half of the deaths.
https://www.heritage.org/public-health/commentary/over-half-us-counties-have-had-no-covid-19-deathsREAD MORE AT THE HERITAGE FOUNDATION
