New Coronavirus Hotspots Flaring Up in Rural America

Reis Thebault and Abigail Hauslohner report: "As the death toll nears 100,000, the disease caused by the virus has made a fundamental shift in who it touches and where it reaches in America, according to a Washington Post analysis of case data and interviews with public health professionals in several states." 

The article summarizes the findings of that analysis: "The pandemic that first struck in major metropolises is now increasingly finding its front line in the country’s rural areas; counties with acres of farmland, cramped meatpacking plants, out-of-the-way prisons and few hospital beds.

"America’s largest and most densely populated cities and suburbs still suffer more infections and deaths per capita, but those overall rates are increasing faster in smaller, rural counties where the virus has spread rapidly in the past month," according to the article.

The article includes numerous infographics, maps, and data to show how the novel coronavirus is upending the narratives about density and spread that emerged at the outset of the public health crisis.