Special Report

This is the County in the Cape Girardeau, MO-IL Metro Area With the Most COVID-19

Samuel Stebbins

Published: September 28, 2021 3:45 am

As the delta variant continues to surge, COVID-19 continues to spread through the population. To date, there have been 42,301,000 reported cases of the virus nationwide — and that number is growing every day.

In the Cape Girardeau metropolitan area, which covers parts of Missouri and Illinois, a total of 13,866 COVID-19 cases have been reported to date. Adjusted for population, there have been 14,275 reported infections for every 100,000 people in the area — above the national rate of 12,929 cases per 100,000 people.

The higher than average per capita COVID-19 infection rate across Cape Girardeau is being driven by a high concentration of the virus in one area in particular.

The broader Cape Girardeau metro area comprises three counties or county equivalents, which can include independent cities — and of them, Cape Girardeau County has the most COVID-19 cases per capita. So far, there have been a total of 11,600 infections in Cape Girardeau County, or 14,810 for every 100,000 people.

A relatively high infection rate does not necessarily mean COVID-19 related fatalities per capita are higher in Cape Girardeau County than they are across all of the Cape Girardeau area, however. There have been a total of 193 coronavirus deaths for every 100,000 people in Cape Girardeau County, in line with 184 COVID-19 deaths per 100,000 across the entire Cape Girardeau metro area.

All COVID-19 data used in this story are current as of Sept. 24, 2021.

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