Health

Every U.S. state is accumulating new virus cases at a faster clip than Canada. Yep, all 50.

Our interactive map puts the pace of America’s coronavirus outbreak in startling perspective

On Tuesday, Canada logged 331 new cases of coronavirus. Not only was that figure dwarfed south of the border by pandemic hotspots like Texas (10,745 cases) and Florida (9,194), but most states—32, to be exact—reported on Tuesday more new residents testing positive for the virus than all of Canada did.

This is the sort of thing Canadian officials are doubtless keeping in mind as they consider extending  the Canada-U.S. border closure by another month, beyond the current end date of July 21. To put things in perspective, they might also bear in mind that only California is more populous than Canada.

On a per capita basis, the coronavirus crisis in the United States is so bad that all 50 states are logging more new cases than Canada is. Every single state. That ranges from Québec’s placid neighbour Vermont, where the seven-day average for new cases (per person) is only 1.3 times worse than Canada’s; to Florida, where the new case rate is a jarring 65 times worse than Canada’s.

Arizona, another popular second-home destination for Canadians, is logging new cases at a rate 57 times greater than Canada. California is 25 times worse than Canada. Border neighbours Washington and Minnesota are, respectively, 11.6 and 12.4 times worse, per person. Even New York, where residents are relieved to have the worst days of the first wave behind them, new cases are popping up at a level near quadruple that of Canada.

The interactive map below shows these comparisons for every state (hover with your cursor on individual states to see the values; for reference, Canada’s seven-day average is 331 new cases, or 8.7 per million).

Granted, parts of Canada aren’t faring as well as others—most notably Alberta, where the per-capita rate of new cases is nearly double that of the country as a whole. In the worst week for new cases in Québec in late April and early May, the province averaged 946 cases per day, according to data compiled by CBC News. That’s 12.6 times higher per-person than Canada as a whole is currently experiencing.

Yet even that low point for the hardest-hit province was not as bad as the current frequency of new coronavirus cases in 21 states, from North Dakota and Wisconsin on down to Alabama (36.5 times worse than Canada) to Louisiana (48.6 times).

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