Ohio counties have some of the highest COVID-19 transmission in the U.S.

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(WJW) — Twenty-four of Ohio’s 88 counties have some of the highest coronavirus transmission nationwide right now, including seven Northeast Ohio counties, federal data shows.

Of the more than 3,200 U.S. counties and territorial equivalents, Ashtabula, Erie, Lorain, Mahoning, Medina, Portage and Trumbull are in the top 20% for cases per 100,000 population within the last week, according to the U.S. Centers for Disease Control and Prevention. All those counties had “high” coronavirus transmission levels for the week ending Nov. 10, the CDC reported.

But the high spread hasn’t correlated to higher hospitalization or death rates. In fact, both are down.

The number of COVID-positive patients hospitalized in Ohio hasn’t changed from a week ago and is down 8% from three weeks ago, the Ohio Hospital Association reported on Wednesday. There were 898 COVID-19 patients in Ohio hospitals as of Wednesday. That’s down from about 6,700 patients reported during the height of the winter surge in January, but up from the summer lull of just under 300 patients.

The state’s weekly COVID-19 death rate is also declining, FOX 8 sister station WCMH reported. Ohio reported its highest death rate in November 2021. But for the week ending Nov. 4, 2022, the Ohio Department of Health reported just eight deaths; it reported 63 deaths the week prior.

“Typically, death numbers lag behind the trends in cases and hospitalizations, which both have been trending downward since August,” ODH spokesperson Ken Gordon told WCMH. “In addition to natural progression of disease, coroners and physicians have six months to complete or make changes to death certificates.

“Because this is just one week worth of data, we also would caution against reading too much into it until we can study the data over several weeks to understand the trends,” he added.

Below is how Ohio counties ranked out of more than 3,200 counties and territorial equivalents nationwide by new cases per 100,000 population — one of the two metrics that factor into their community transmission levels — using data released on Nov. 10. The CDC also reports the number of hospital admissions per 100,000 population, as well as the percentage of inpatient beds being utilized by COVID-19 patients.