NY Times listed the 100 counties in the United States with the highest average number of COVID-19 cases, sorted by recent cases, which they define as new cases over the past two weeks. If you want to skip to the punchline, scroll to the bottom of this post to find the NY Times list.
The NY Times methodology, which includes confirmed and probable cases, matches the Texas Department of State Health Services numbers provided to and shared by Frio County.
To compare across counties with varying populations, the NY Times started with Frio County’s new cases over the past two weeks (89), used our population figure from the Census American Community Survey (19,394), and calculated what Frio’s number would be if our population were 100,000.
The math looks like this, solve for X:
89 = X
19,394 100,000
For Frio County, our X value, or new cases over the past two weeks per 100,000 residents is 459. To be clear, Frio County does not have 100,000 residents or 459 active cases. This formula was applied to all counties in the country, which each have widely varying populations, to compare various counties’ rates of spread compared to their populations.
New York Times applied this formula to every county. This list was updated June 23. In that time, DSHS reported only four GEO detainee cases, meaning our hot spot status is mainly a result of cases in our community.
Today, June 23, Frio County ranks 66 out of the top 100 county COVID-19 hot spots in the country over the past two weeks: