Special Report

This Is the County in the Fort Smith, AR-OK Metro Area With the Least COVID-19

Samuel Stebbins

Published: January 12, 2022 2:45 am

As the omicron variant spreads, new daily cases of COVID-19 have hit new highs in the United States. To date, 58,313,875 Americans have been infected with the virus — and 827,991 have died as a result. On a per capita basis, the U.S. has one of the highest known infections rates in the world.

In the Fort Smith metropolitan area, which covers parts of Arkansas and Oklahoma, a total of 53,030 COVID-19 cases have been reported to date. Adjusted for population, there have been 18,858 reported infections for every 100,000 people in the area — above the national rate of 17,824 cases per 100,000 people.

Though per capita cases of COVID-19 are higher in Fort Smith than they are nationwide, some parts of the metro area are safer than others.

The broader Fort Smith metro area comprises four counties or county equivalents — and of them, Sequoyah County in Oklahoma has the fewest COVID-19 cases per capita. So far, there have been a total of 7,248 infections in Sequoyah County, or 17,525 for every 100,000 people.

Not only does Sequoyah County have the lowest per capita infection rate in the Fort Smith metro area, it also has a relatively low per capita fatality rate.

There have been a total of 227 coronavirus-related deaths for every 100,000 people in Sequoyah County, below the 284 COVID-19 deaths per 100,000 across the entire Fort Smith metro area.

All COVID-19 data used in this story are current as of Jan. 10, 2022.

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