Rhode Island, the smallest U.S. state in area, now has the fastest spread of coronavirus, with more new cases per capita being reported than any other state, according to a New York Times database.
While rates of new cases have climbed throughout the Northeast in recent weeks, Rhode Island has gotten much worse much faster than its neighbors. Over the past week, it has averaged more than 1,300 new cases a day, or 123.5 cases for every 100,000 people.
By contrast, Connecticut is averaging 78.2 cases for every 100,000, and Massachusetts 71. Midwestern states like South Dakota and Minnesota that had the worst spread in the nation a few weeks ago have fallen down into the 90s by this measure.
The state moved aggressively in the spring to try to keep the virus out, establishing quarantine rules and setting up checkpoints on major highways to stem the flow of people from hard-hit New York. Its case counts stayed relatively low for most of the summer. But after Labor Day and the start of the school year, case numbers began climbing steadily, and have not slowed since.
Gov. Gina Raimondo has imposed a two-week “pause” on the economy, and with health care workers in short supply, the state Department of Health has begun issuing temporary licenses to doctors, nurses and others who have retired, are visiting the state or have recently completing training programs.
“We need you,” the governor implored on Twitter.
Experts attribute some of Rhode Island’s relative vulnerability to its compact size and the concentration of its population in Providence, the capital. In contrast, next-door Massachusetts has large rural areas where case rates are low, but in Rhode Island an outbreak is likely to spread quickly through densely packed urban households. Studies indicate that as many as half of Covid-19 cases arise through transmission from one member of a household to another.
“One of the things Rhode Island suffers from in the context of Covid is that it’s not a very big state in terms of its footprint,’’ said Samuel Scarpino, an assistant professor at the Network Science Institute at Northeastern University. “It’s as though Massachusetts was getting reported on in terms of only what’s happening in Boston.’’
On surveys that measure social distancing and masking, Rhode Island is about even with Massachusetts and other states in the Northeast, Dr. Scarpino said. But the nationwide mobility data that his laboratory tracks shows that people in Rhode Island, like those elsewhere, have been leaving home to go to work this month and last at a rate of about 60 percent of what was once normal, compared to only 40 percent in early September. Rhode Island also ranked above the U.S. average in mobility over the Thanksgiving holiday.
“All of those things contribute to more cases getting into households,’’ Dr. Scarpino said.
Other factors that might be contributing to the heavy Rhode Island caseload, Megan L. Ranney, an emergency room physician and associate professor at Brown University suggested on Twitter, include a large population of college students whose return in the fall seeded some transmission chains and — in a pandemic that has disproportionately affected low-income workers who cannot afford to stay home — the state’s high poverty rate compared with others in the region. Like some other states, Rhode Island only imposed new restrictions on restaurants, bars and gyms after case counts had begun to surge.
“At the end of the day, regardless of the reason,’’ Dr. Ranney tweeted, “our hospitals are overwhelmed & everyone knows someone who’s sick.”
Source : Nytimes
