If the U.S. continues to polarize, or to get even worse, about masks and vaccines, more or less along political lines (which are also rural/urban, and somewhat regional) can we imagine that C-19 will be virulent and deadly eventually in specific parts of the country with low rates of vaccination and low rates of masking, social distancing, handwashing, staying at home, etc.? At the same time, will there be sections that have virtually wiped out the pandemic? I realize that people travel from area to area, and that it will be a long time before vaccines have an effect on appreciable parts of the population, but say six months down the line, will there be hot spots with high death and hospitalization rates and other spots where life has returned close to a pre-pandemic normal? There’s such a wide polarization on the question “Will you get vaccinated?” (which seems to me no question at all) that I can see it lingering in certain counties for years and years.
Countering the effects you mention is that rural areas are inherently more socially-distanced, and so, absent the political effects, you’d expect rural areas to be hit less hard.
But of course, those two effects probably won’t exactly cancel out, so yes, you’re almost certain to see regional differences (especially once vaccines become widely available, and the set of people who aren’t vaccinated are precisely the group who choose not to be).
Well, there is certainly a strong argument to be made that it’s been highly regional so far, without regard to any politics whatsoever.
Before I lived so many years in rural areas, I thought this way, too. There’s this false notion that people in rural areas stay in their geographically-distanced houses and don’t see other humans very often, when the fact is, they simply drive farther. That farmer’s husband works as a nurse in town. That rancher’s wife is a school secretary. They drive farther to go to church or the mall or to bowl on league nights, but they go, and often. They eat out. Families drive in from all over on holidays. Neighbors get together to celebrate birthdays and anniversaries or just to socialize. Last summer, they packed into the stands at rodeos. It’s true they’re not crammed into subways or walking down crowded streets, but they’re certainly not inherently socially distanced.
Once COVID finds its way to an area, it spreads pretty quickly. Of course, it spreads faster when people aren’t masking up or following protocol, and most rural areas are conservative and still railing against masking, etc. For both those reasons, rural areas are experiencing huge spikes in COVID cases.
Yes, but a lot of the folks you see in those places are the same people, and a lot of the folks they see are the same, and so on. It’ll spread faster in that interconnected community, but it’ll take longer to get a toehold. The net effect is that, in an ordinary contagion, urban areas are hit much worse, overall, than rural areas. The fact that COVID is hitting rural areas harder is a testament to just how stupid they’re being.
From what I remember about flu spread, that’s how most epidemics happen regardless. The metro areas have earlier, quicker spread but it still reaches rural and sweeps through with similar infection numbers.
So not to be too morbid here (and certainly not gleeful) but could we see the virus localized to rural America before it fizzles out? IOW, will the final several hundred thousand deaths from C-19 occur in rural areas while very few are occurring in cities?
I’m not convinced of the premise that vaccine uptake will be drastically different in rural/red America. It’s a quick thing to “get this over with” compared to restaurant closures and mask wearing.
I wish I agreed with you, but when people are throwing maskless parties just because “virus? We’re not afraid of no stinkin’ virus!”, I don’t think we can expect them to behave rationally in any other way, either.
Don’t you think that if this were to be the case, the driving factor would be a sort of ‘herd immunity’ in the cities?
Herd immunity from the vaccine is indeed what they’re talking about.
I don’t think even NYC is close to herd immunity and it was hit hard in March/April and hard again recently. It has “only” had about 1 million documented cases, out of almost 8.5 million. Total cases is likely higher, but given that the case rate is rising like crazy, obviously not high enough for herd immunity.
So, wouldn’t there then remain a vulnerable population? I’m trying to figure out why people in the cities would stop dying before those in rural areas.
I don’t have a link handy at the moment, but a couple days ago I was reading a story about influenza outbreaks coming earlier to urban areas but being more intense, with shorter durations, in rural ones.
I feel like I’ve lost the train here, but in general, more mask usage, better access to healthcare. I live in a suburb of NYC and I’m within 10 minutes of two large hospitals, within 25 minutes of a couple more, and within 45 minutes of several more, and that’s not including the ones in NYC.
In some rural areas, a very high percentage of households can have someone who works in one or two major employers in the region, and almost every household is connected to those households. Also, there may not be that many churches. And only one K-12 school.
You see this in west TX in communities where the local feedlot/meat packing plant is the only game in town. Once it gets there, it’s everywhere.
Add to that very, very sparse medical facilities and it’s a recipe for a truly appalling situation.
Per worldometers, the 7 most infected states per million are the Dakotas, Iowa, Tennessee, Utah, Nebraska, Wisconsin. Total population of one metropolis or so. All have had over 8% of there population test positive. Not included are those not tested which could be quite a few more. So yes, it does get around at the feed mill and schools and churches and diners. All have had declining rates over the past 2 weeks having peaked in November.