As the U.S. transitions into winter, COVID-19 cases are again on the rise, but the new hot spots are in rural states. Bloomberg News reports that as of October 19, the highest case rates per capita for the previous seven days had been in North and South Dakota, Montana, Wisconsin and Utah.

Rural America had been largely spared from widespread infections compared to dense urban areas. However, the fear was that the limited healthcare infrastructure would be insufficient to respond to rural outbreaks. Based on the seven-day rolling average of new cases, New Mexico, Missouri, South Dakota, Michigan and Illinois have seen the biggest increases in the past week, by percentage.

Michael Osterholm, director of the Center for Infectious Disease Research and Policy at the University of Minnesota, has warned the public that the pandemic is still in its early stages, saying, “We’re just getting started, how bad it’s going to be is dependent on how the population responds. Right now, up to a third of the public doesn’t believe this is real; they believe it’s a hoax.”

Read the full article by Bloomberg News here: https://www.bloomberg.com/news/newsletters/2020-10-19/a-troubling-rural-trend-in-america

You can get up-to-date and accurate information on COVID-19 in your community at https://covid.cdc.gov/covid-data-tracker/index.html#county-map