Seventy-three of Michigan’s 83 counties are reporting accelerated rates of coronavirus, including a dozen counties in the highest risk level for COVID-19 spread, based on a metric developed by the Harvard Global Health Initiative.
Kent, Calhoun, Cass and Mecosta are among the hardest hit counties as of Wednesday, Oct. 22. The four Lower Peninsula Counties are coded red on the map below, meaning they’re averaging more than 25 new cases per 100,000 people per day over the last week.
In the Upper Peninsula, 10 counties are in that same red risk level. They include Dickinson (82 cases per 100,000 residents), Iron (72), Delta (54), Marquette (54), Alger (39), Menominee (42), Gogebic (37), Mackinac (36), Ontonagon (35) and Luce (25).
Among the counties with significant increases:
- Marquette increased 163% from 96 new cases last week to 252 new cases in the past seven days;
- Cass increased 103% from 64 cases to 130 cases;
- Berrien increased 84% from 143 cases to 263 cases;
- Washtenaw increased 78% from 297 cases to 529 cases;
- Saginaw increased 65% from 133 cases to 220 cases;
- Oakland increased 50% from 721 cases to 1,080 cases.
The map below is shaded based on the Harvard institute metric. The arrows indicate whether the total number of cases between Oct. 15-21 has gone up or down compared to the previous seven days (Oct. 8-Oct 14).
Readers can put their cursor over a county to see the underlying data. If you can’t see the map, click here.
Latest on coronavirus testing
The federal Centers for Disease Control says schools are safe to open if fewer than 5% of coronavirus tests over the past week are positive.
Over the last week, Michigan has averaged a positive test rate of 5.13%. Of its 83 counties, 33 reported a rate of 5% or higher over the last seven days, according to data from the Department of Health and Human Services.
Dickinson County leads the way with 17.5% of tests coming back positive. The next three counties -- Delta, Marquette, and Mackinac -- are also in the Upper Peninsula and have positive rates of 9.6%, 9.1% and 8.9%, respectively.
The highest rates in the Lower Peninsula are in Cass County (8.9%), Calhoun County (8.5%), and Macomb County (7.5%).
Note: The number of positive tests does not match confirmed cases because a single patient may be tested multiple times.
The map below shows the seven-day average testing rate by county. Once again, readers can put their cursor over a county to see the underlying data. If you can’t see the map, click here.
Below are online databases that allow readers to look up county-level data for each of the last 20 days.
Cases by day it was reported to the state
First is a chart showing new cases reported to the state each day for the past 20 days. This is based on when a confirmed coronavirus test is reported to the state, which means the patient first became sick days before.
You can call up a chart for any county, and you can put your cursor over a bar to see the date and number of cases. (As of Sept. 1, the state stopped reporting numbers on Sundays.)
(In a few instances, a county reported a negative number (decline) in daily new cases, following a retroactive reclassification by the Michigan Department of Health and Human Services. In those instances, we subtracted cases from the prior date and put 0 in the reported date.)
The next chart below shows new cases for the past 20 days based on onset of symptoms. In this chart, numbers for the most recent days are incomplete because of the lag time between people getting sick and getting a confirmed coronavirus test result, which can take up to a week or more.
You can call up a chart for any county, and you can put your cursor over a bar to see the date and number of cases.
More localized maps
Below are two maps created by the EpiBayes research group at University of Michigan’s Department of Epidemiology, which has access to sub-county data collected by the Michigan Department of Health and Human Services.
The interactive maps break down the state into 10 kilometer hexogons to provide more a more localized look at where coronavirus cases are occurring. You can click here to get to the research project website.
The first map looks at confirmed and probable coronavirus cases in the past week. You can click on a hexagon to see the underlying data.
You can use the triangle button at the upper right of the map to toggle to the second map, which shows total confirmed coronavirus cases and deaths since the start of the pandemic.
Latest daily report
On Wednesday, the state reported 1,597 new cases of coronavirus and 33 new deaths.
The state’s seven-day average is now 1,704 cases and 21 deaths per day, compared to an average of 1,174 cases and 13 deaths a week ago.
The map below shows total confirmed coronavirus cases and deaths since the start of the pandemic. You can put your cursor over a county to see the underlying numbers.
For more statewide data, visit MLive’s coronavirus data page, here. To find a testing site near you, check out the state’s online test finder, here, send an email to COVID19@michigan.gov, or call 888-535-6136 between 8 a.m. and 5 p.m. on weekdays.
For more data on COVID-19 in Michigan, visit https://www.mlive.com/coronavirus/data/.
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