COVID-19 community levels: 2/16/2023
Note: our updates can be a week behind due to our news cycle overlapping with Thursday updates. View the latest CDC and NYTimes updates here.
COVID-19 Community Levels is a tool to help communities decide what prevention steps to take based on the latest data.
All of our synod’s counties are at at low levels: Apache, Clark, Cochise, Coconino, Gila, Graham, Greenlee, La Paz, Maricopa, Mohave, Navajo, Nye, Pima, Pinal, Santa Cruz, Washington, Yavapai, and Yuma.
At all levels including the low level, prevention steps include:
Stay up to date with COVID-19 vaccines
Get tested if you have symptoms
At the medium level, if you are at high risk for severe illness, talk to your healthcare provider about whether you need to wear a mask and take other precautions.
At the high level, wear a mask indoors in public. Additional precautions may be needed for people at high risk for severe illness.
Levels can be low, medium, or high and are determined by looking at hospital beds being used, hospital admissions, and the total number of new COVID-19 cases in an area.
State of the virus
State of the virus
Update for February 10
Cases, hospitalizations and deaths are all down in recent weeks, though a slight uptick in test positivity suggests that this progress could soon end.
Already, the South is emerging as something of a hotspot. Alabama and Louisiana currently have the country's highest per-capita case rates, and reported cases have risen by more than 25 percent in both states over the past two weeks.
Deaths remain persistently high despite recent improvements. On average, more than 3,000 people are dying of Covid in the U.S. each week.
How to read Covid data now
Higher test positivity rates are a sign that many infections are not reported — even if they are tested for at home. This results in a more severe undercount of cases. The number of hospitalized patients with Covid is a more reliable measure because testing is more consistent in hospitals. Read more about the data.