Special Report

This is the County in the Raleigh, NC Metro Area With the Most COVID-19

Samuel Stebbins

Published: September 28, 2021 4:15 am

As the delta variant continues to surge, COVID-19 continues to spread through the population. To date, there have been 42,301,000 reported cases of the virus nationwide — and that number is growing every day.

In the Raleigh metropolitan area, located in North Carolina, a total of 159,575 COVID-19 cases have been reported to date. Adjusted for population, there have been 12,250 reported infections for every 100,000 people in the area — below the national rate of 12,929 cases per 100,000 people.

Even though Raleigh has fewer COVID-19 infections per capita than the national average, there are parts of the metro area where this is not the case.

The broader Raleigh metro area comprises three counties or county equivalents, which can include independent cities — and of them, Johnston County has the most COVID-19 cases per capita. So far, there have been a total of 30,239 infections in Johnston County, or 15,818 for every 100,000 people.

Not only does Johnston County have the most COVID-19 infections per capita in the Raleigh 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 151 coronavirus deaths for every 100,000 people in Johnston County, compared to 90 COVID-19 deaths per 100,000 across the entire Raleigh metro area.

All COVID-19 data used in this story are current as of Sept. 24, 2021.

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