Story at a glance
- As rates of new COVID-19 cases continue to decline, researchers took a look at which states handled the pandemic the best to protect their residents.
- Vermont came out on top, followed by North Carolina, Rhode Island and New Hampshire.
- On average, Democratic states tended to fare better than Republican states over the course of the crisis.
As the nation continues to meet the challenges of the COVID-19 pandemic, a new WalletHub analysis assessed which states best protected its residents during the crisis.
To do so, researchers compiled data on community transmission levels, rates of positive testing, hospitalizations, deaths, and share of eligible populations that are vaccinated as of August 2022. Data were then converted into a score out of 100, with 100 points representing the safest conditions. Weighted averages were used to determine each state’s overall score.
In recent weeks, new cases of COVID-19 have slowly begun to decrease, and around 67 percent of the nation’s population has been vaccinated against COVID-19.
However, on the state level WalletHub found Vermont ranked the best out of the country for keeping its residents safe, with a score of 75.95. North Carolina, Rhode Island, New Hampshire, Connecticut, Maine, and Hawaii followed, respectively.
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The bottom 10 slots were occupied by Louisiana, being the worst with a score of 14.31, followed by West Virginia, Tennessee, Georgia, Kentucky, Indiana and Mississippi.
Results are similar to findings of another recent study that tracked the most and least healthy states in the country. In that analysis, researchers found Vermont was the third healthiest state, while New Hampshire and Connecticut were in the top 10.
Conversely, Louisiana, West Virginia, and Mississippi ranked as some of the least healthy states.
According to the WalletHub analysis these states all had high COVID-19 death rates and low vaccination rates.
However, several states surveyed, like Alabama, reported low COVID-19 death rates along with low vaccination rates.
Tied for first place, North Carolina, Washington D.C., Massachusetts, New York and Pennsylvania had the highest rates of vaccinated residents. Wyoming came in last, outranked by Mississippi and Louisiana, respectively.
In addition, Vermont had the lowest positive testing rate recorded, while Missouri and Tennessee had the highest rates of positive tests.
Similar to trends documented throughout the pandemic, states who voted for a Democrat in the 2020 election tended to be safer than those that went Republican.
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