Special Report

COVID-19: This is the Most Dangerous County in the Portland-South Portland, ME Metro Area

Samuel Stebbins

Published: April 9, 2021 3:45 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 30,475,900 reported cases of the virus nationwide — and that number is growing every day.

In the Portland-South Portland metropolitan area, located in Maine, a total of 26,355 COVID-19 cases have been reported to date. Adjusted for population, there have been 4,979 reported infections for every 100,000 people in the area — below the national rate of 9,315 cases per 100,000 people.

Even though Portland-South Portland 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 Portland metro area comprises three counties or county equivalents, which can include independent cities — and of them, York County has the most COVID-19 cases per capita. So far, there have been a total of 11,045 infections in York County, or 5,438 for every 100,000 people.

A relatively high infection rate does not necessarily mean COVID-19 related fatalities per capita are higher in York County than they are across all of the Portland area, however. There have been a total of 63 coronavirus deaths for every 100,000 people in York County, in line with 60 COVID-19 deaths per 100,000 across the entire Portland-South Portland metro area.

All COVID-19 data used in this story are current as of April 7, 2021.

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