Arizona has become the state with the highest rate of new COVID-19 infections, a Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC) tracker reported Monday.
The U.S. CDC map indicated Monday evening that Copper State had overtaken neighboring California, as well as other South Carolina and Tennessee hotspots, to rise to the forefront with an increase in the rate of new cases. Now the state reports an average daily case rate of more than 121 per 100,000 population, the only U.S. state with an average of more than 100 new cases per day per 100,000 residents.
Complicating Arizona’s data collection is a large part of the state where information remains incomplete pending approval from Native American tribal authorities. High transmission rates of COVID-19 are being reported statewide, but particularly around the capital, Phoenix, according to state health officials.
Arizona is one of the few states that has been reluctant to employ strict measures to control the virus. It does not have a mask mandate and remains largely devoid of restrictions on indoor dining activities, bars and nightclubs that other states implemented months ago to curb the spread of COVID-19.
The state reached a record number of hospitalizations derived from the virus last month, with more than 4,300 hospitalized statewide with coronavirus. Governor Doug Ducey
Doug Ducey: Seven Senate races to see 2022 Arizona set COVID-19 patient record in ICU voters voting for Biden amid national slow-fire tensions (R) briefly introduced measures to stay home last spring, but declared as early as May that the state “was clearly on the other side of this pandemic” and relaxed those measures.