Special Report

This is the County in the Rapid City, SD Metro Area With the Most COVID-19

Samuel Stebbins

Published: September 14, 2021 4:15 am

As the delta variant continues to surge, COVID-19 continues to spread through the population. To date, there have been 40,330,400 reported cases of the virus nationwide — and that number is growing every day.

In the Rapid City metropolitan area, located in South Dakota, a total of 21,547 COVID-19 cases have been reported to date. Adjusted for population, there have been 14,830 reported infections for every 100,000 people in the area — above the national rate of 12,327 cases per 100,000 people.

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

The broader Rapid City metro area comprises three counties or county equivalents, which can include independent cities — and of them, Pennington County has the most COVID-19 cases per capita. So far, there have been a total of 16,818 infections in Pennington County, or 15,388 for every 100,000 people.

Not only does Pennington County have the most COVID-19 infections per capita in the Rapid City 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 194 coronavirus deaths for every 100,000 people in Pennington County, compared to 178 COVID-19 deaths per 100,000 across the entire Rapid City metro area.

All COVID-19 data used in this story are current as of Sept. 10, 2021.

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