How did the coronavirus impact change in US as it continued to spread?
By OMRI RONDECEMBER 9, 2020 11:47A protective face mask is seen as curbs to fight the spread of coronavirus disease (COVID-19) have been reimposed after a rise in new cases, at Zikim beach in southern Israel July 21, 2020. Picture taken July 21, 2020.(photo credit: AMIR COHEN/REUTERS)
As the pandemic progressed, the death toll which had originally been concentrated in cities had begun spreading to suburban and rural places.
The impact of the coronavirus pandemic on various areas has changed since it was declared a national emergency in the US, according to a new Pew Research Center analysis.As the coronavirus spread across the US, its impact changed, affecting areas a certain way at the start and differently later on. At the start of the pandemic, most of the cases and deaths were found in large cities such as New York, New Orleans, Boston and Detroit, with rural areas being affected less severely. However, as the pandemic progressed, the death toll began spreading to suburban and rural areas.In addition, more racially and ethnically diverse areas were hit harder in the beginning than less racially and ethnically diverse areas, according to the analysis.AdvertisementThese characteristics are associated with the partisan and ideological leanings of an area, so the congressional districts experiencing the brunt of cases and deaths in those early months were far more likely to be represented by Democrats than by Republicans.However, as the coronavirus spread to more areas, this has shifted somewhat, with recent months seeing a change in the average death tolls, placing the average in Republican districts higher than the one in Democrat areas.Starting in November, the number of coronavirus deaths has been on the rise in both Republican and Democratic districts. Although the average Democrat district still has more total coronavirus deaths than the average Republican one, the gap has become narrower than it had been at the start of the pandemic.The data used in the analysis was based on estimates of the number of deaths attributed to the coronavirus calculated using county-level figures, which were collected and reported by the Center for Systems Science and Engineering at John Hopkins University.
