Special Report

These are the Counties in the Charlotte-Concord-Gastonia, NC-SC Metro Area With the Most COVID-19

Samuel Stebbins

Published: July 30, 2021 3:15 am

Though vaccine distribution is well underway across the United States, the novel coronavirus continues to spread through the population. To date, there have been 34,256,300 reported cases of the virus nationwide — and that number is growing every day.

In the Charlotte-Concord-Gastonia metropolitan area, which covers parts of North Carolina and South Carolina, a total of 288,535 COVID-19 cases have been reported to date. Adjusted for population, there have been 11,667 reported infections for every 100,000 people in the area — above the national rate of 10,471 cases per 100,000 people.

The higher than average per capita COVID-19 infection rate across Charlotte-Concord-Gastonia is being driven by a high concentration of the virus in one area in particular.

The broader Charlotte metro area comprises 10 counties or county equivalents, which can include independent cities — and of them, Chester County has the most COVID-19 cases per capita. So far, there have been a total of 4,338 infections in Chester County, or 13,420 for every 100,000 people.

Not only does Chester County have the most COVID-19 infections per capita in the Charlotte 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 238 coronavirus deaths for every 100,000 people in Chester County, compared to 130 COVID-19 deaths per 100,000 across the entire Charlotte-Concord-Gastonia metro area.

All COVID-19 data used in this story are current as of July 28, 2021.

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