Special Report

This Is the County in the Washington-Arlington-Alexandria, DC-VA-MD-WV Metro Area With the Most COVID-19

Samuel Stebbins

Published: May 17, 2022 2:30 am

There have been 81,417,100 confirmed cases of COVID-19 in the United States to date – and that number continues to grow.

In the Washington-Arlington-Alexandria metropolitan area, which covers all the District of Columbia, and parts of Virginia, Maryland, and West Virginia, a total of 1,149,731 cases of COVID-19 have been reported. Adjusted for population, there have been 18,730 confirmed infections for every 100,000 people in the area — below the national rate of 24,885 cases per 100,000 people.

Even though Washington-Arlington-Alexandria has fewer COVID-19 infections per capita than the national average, there are parts of the metro area that appear to be at higher risk than others.

The broader Washington metro area comprises 24 counties or county equivalents, which can include independent cities — and of them, Jefferson County has the most COVID-19 cases per capita. So far, there have been a total of 14,475 confirmed infections in Jefferson County, or 25,766 for every 100,000 people.

Not only does Jefferson County have the most COVID-19 infections per capita in the Washington area, it also has more deaths attributable to the virus per capita than the metro area as a whole. There have been a total of 233 coronavirus deaths for every 100,000 people in Jefferson County, compared to 179 COVID-19 deaths per 100,000 across the entire Washington-Arlington-Alexandria metro area.

All COVID-19 data used in this story are current as of May 13, 2022.

These are all the counties in West Virginia where COVID-19 is slowing (and where it’s still getting worse).