Counties that banned in-person religious gatherings and those with a greater number of hospitals per capita were associated with a decreased case-fatality rate of COVID-19 during the pandemic's first wave, according to a new University of Michigan study.
On the other hand, counties with high prevalence of asthma and a greater concentration of people over 65 were linked to higher fatality rates, the analysis showed.
This study, published in PLOS ONE, was completed as part of the COVID-19 Dispersed Volunteer Research Network and was presented at the World Microbe Forum, a collaborative virtual meeting conference hosted by the American Society for Microbiology and the Federation of European Microbiological Societies, earlier this year.
"Our work provides insights that may help officials target public health interventions and health care resources to locations that are at increased risk of COVID-19 fatalities in subsequent waves," said Jess Millar, a graduate research assistant in the U-M departments of Computational Medicine and Bioinformatics, and of Epidemiology.
