Special Report

This is the County in the Gulfport-Biloxi-Pascagoula, MS Metro Area With the Most COVID-19

Samuel Stebbins

Published: June 11, 2021 4:30 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 33,056,400 reported cases of the virus nationwide — and that number is growing every day.

In the Gulfport-Biloxi-Pascagoula metropolitan area, located in Mississippi, a total of 35,727 COVID-19 cases have been reported to date. Adjusted for population, there have been 9,130 reported infections for every 100,000 people in the area — below the national rate of 10,104 cases per 100,000 people.

Even though Gulfport-Biloxi-Pascagoula has fewer COVID-19 infections per capita than the national average, there are parts of the metro area that appear to be higher risk than others.

The broader Gulfport metro area comprises three counties or county equivalents, which can include independent cities — and of them, Jackson County has the most COVID-19 cases per capita. So far, there have been a total of 13,616 infections in Jackson County, or 9,588 for every 100,000 people.

Not only does Jackson County have the most COVID-19 infections per capita in the Gulfport 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 175 coronavirus deaths for every 100,000 people in Jackson County, compared to 166 COVID-19 deaths per 100,000 across the entire Gulfport-Biloxi-Pascagoula metro area.

All COVID-19 data used in this story are current as of June 9, 2021.

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