May 28, 2020

A review of Ohio infections and deaths by race as reported by the COVID Tracking project shows that as of yesterday, whites accounted for 52 percent of infections while African Americans accounted for 25 percent and other and unknown race designations accounted for 23 percent of infections. The disproportionate representation of African Americans in the total cases is consistent with patterns noted throughout the Country. Surprisingly, Whites accounted for 80 percent of fatalties while African Americans only accounted for 17 percent of total COVID-19 deaths.

A comparison of COVID-19 fatalities for May 21 and May 28 reveals there have been 2,098 deaths, a 14 percent increase of this time last week.

May 26, 2020

As of May 26, 2020 there have been 33,006 reported cases of COVID-19 reported for the state of Ohio. Tragically, the Ohio Department of Health is also reporting deaths now exceed 2,000. While expected, it is nonetheless shocking. Analysis of total infections and cases per 100,000 by county shows the Southeast Counties to be the least affected (with the exception of recent outbreaks in the Belmont and Hocking County areas). Total cases are still largely concentrated in the urban areas.

Analysis of daily cases over time shows that infections since May 1st are drifting slowly downward. 

May 21, 2020

Today's COVID-19 blog examines COVID-19 fatalities through 5-21-20. The data continues to show that a disproportionate number of Ohio COVID-19 fatalities are among older Ohioans with 92 percent of all deaths accounted for by persons 60 and older. Conversely, no deaths have yet been recorded for persons under 20 and only 5 deaths (.3 percent) have been recorded for persons under thirty.

There have been more male fatalities (968) than female (867) and males tend to die somewhat younger. This would suggest that males are more likely to experience underlying diseases that would make them more vulnerable to the virus.

Over the last week, COVID-19 related fatalities increased by 19.7%. Take a look at the following tables and graphs for a more in-depth review of COVID-19 fatalities.

Webinar Information!

Ohio University and the Ohio Alliance for Innovation in Population Health will be hosting a webinar on Wednesday, June 24, 2020 from 12-1p. Join partners from around Ohio for Alliance Engagement in Community Impacted Initiatives. Registration is free at https://ohio.qualtrics.com/jfe/form/SV_eP9A04mGhBmbNHf.

May 18, 2020

Several readers have recently commented on how the change in day-to-day infections in most counties is small. So starting today, we will produce a week-to week comparison of infections for Monday and and another week-to week comparison of fatalities at the end of the week. We will continue to include a second report that covers another area of interest in these twice weekly reports. Please let us know what aspect of the pandemic you are most interested in, and we will do our best to obtain data and cover the topic.

For today's report we looked at how Ohio performed in comparison to the U.S. as a whole in deploying COVID-19 testing. While this is a complicated area and there are a number of different potential measures, our cursory analysis shows that Ohio's rate of increased testing was slightly better than the national average. 

A comparison of infections for 5-11 and 5-18 shows that statewide infections increased by 14.7 percent for the seven day period. Several counties in the Southeast, most notably Hocking, experienced growth rates that dramatically exceeded state averages. This is consistent with national reports that suggest slowing growth rates in urban communities and upticks in rural areas that have been previously less affected.

May 15, 2020

Analysis of Ohio COVID-19 infections and deaths since March 1st shows slow but steady growth for both categories through mid April, with a significant spike in counts caused by exponential spread in two (2) Central Ohio state prisons. As a result, infections have continued to occur at a steady but much lower pace while deaths have broadly declined.

As of May 15th there were 26,954 cases and 1,581 deaths. These numbers represent 2.3 and 3.1 percent increases over counts recorded for the previous day.

May 14, 2020

As of May 14, 2020 there are 26,357 Ohioans that have been infected with the COVID-19 Virus and 1,534 Deaths. This represents a 2.5 percent and 3.4 percent increase respectively in both categories. 

A review of total COVID-19 tests and deaths across the nation reveals there are a total of 9,974,726 tests and 78,343 nationwide fatalities as of today. This is equal to 520 tests for every death. Generally speaking, we assume that those states where the ratio of tests to deaths is high, are doing a better job of deploying tests than those states where the number of tests to deaths is small. Ohio ranks 42 out of the U.S. states and territories with a ratio of 152 tests per COVID-19 fatality.