Updated figures show that the 15 states with the biggest jumps in their COVID-19 hospitalization rates over the past two weeks are in the north.
October is here, the weather is getting a little cooler, schools are reopened, and people will start spending more time indoors. And this morning, updated figures from the U.S. Department of Health and Human Services reveal which states have had the highest increases in their COVID-19 hospitalization rates:
Maine
14-day change: 22 percent increase
Hospitalizations per 100,000 people: 18Pennsylvania
14-day change: 19 percent increase
Hospitalizations per 100,000 people: 25North Dakota
14-day change: 18 percent increase
Hospitalizations per 100,000 people: 32Montana
14-day change: 17 percent increase
Hospitalizations per 100,000 people: 42Vermont
14-day change: 17 percent increase
Hospitalizations per 100,000 people: 7West Virginia
14-day change: 16 percent increase
Hospitalizations per 100,000 people: 60Minnesota
14-day change: 11 percent increase
Hospitalizations per 100,000 people: 16Wisconsin
14-day change: 11 percent increase
Hospitalizations per 100,000 people: 21Michigan
14-day change: 10 percent increase
Hospitalizations per 100,000 people: 16Idaho
14-day change: 9 percent increase
Hospitalizations per 100,000 people: 42Iowa
14-day change: 9 percent increase
Hospitalizations per 100,000 people: 22Ohio
14-day change: 9 percent increase
Hospitalizations per 100,000 people: 36Rhode Island
14-day change: 8 percent increase
Hospitalizations per 100,000 people: 11New Hampshire
14-day change: 6 percent increase
Hospitalizations per 100,000 people: 11Wyoming
14-day change: 5 percent increase
Hospitalizations per 100,000 people: 39
Some of these states have Republican governors, some of them have Democratic governors. Some of these states have big cities, and some are more rural. Some of these states enacted stricter regulations because of the pandemic, and some have looser ones. So what do all of these 15 states have in common? They’re all in the northern half of the country. The Delta wave has already swept through the South, and is now receding. Many southern states still have fairly high hospitalization rates per 100,000 people — North Carolina is at 30, Florida is at 31, Texas is at 37, South Carolina is at 40. But those states’ hospitalization rates are all decreasing compared to two weeks ago — North Carolina is down 11 percent, Florida is down 39 percent, Texas is down 22 percent, South Carolina is down 19 percent.
A lot of commentators seemed to relish making a moral judgment about the southern states that saw cases and hospitalizations rising dramatically in late summer. Indeed, southern states generally had lower vaccination rates, although those rates are slowly inching up, week by week. Almost 70 percent of Floridians have gotten at least one shot, 59.5 percent of Texans, about the same for North Carolinians, and 55 percent of South Carolinians – and keep in mind, these figures are for total population, which includes the kids who can’t get vaccinated yet. (Notice the three least-vaccinated states – Wyoming, West Virginia, and Idaho – haven’t gotten nearly as much attention as Florida and Texas.)
No doubt, vaccination rates are a factor in the number of hospitalizations. (Vaccination does not prevent infection, so highly vaccinated states can still have a lot of cases.) But the big uncontrollable factor is temperature. As summer got hotter, southerners spent more time indoors, seeking relief from the heat in air conditioning — putting themselves in situations where they were more likely to catch the virus from each other. While this pandemic is often surprising us, we should not be surprised to see both cases and hospitalizations increasing in the northern states in the coming weeks and months, as colder weather makes northerners spend more time indoors.