COVID-19 community levels: 1/12/2022
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.
Medium level counties include Clark, Coconino, Gila, La Paz, Maricopa, Nye, Mohave, Pinal, Santa Cruz, Washington, Yavapai, and Yuma.
Low level counties are Apache, Cochise, Graham, Greenlee, Pima, and Navajo.
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
Update for January 6
Hospitalizations, test positivity and deaths are all rising at the national level, and reported cases have also begun to tick up modestly after a holiday lull.
These metrics remain far below their all-time highs, but the growth in hospitalizations is concerning. Around 47,000 people are currently hospitalized with the coronavirus, which is the highest number seen since last March.
The Northeast continues to see many of the worst per-capita hospitalization rates, and rates are rising in the Southeast as well. In Western states like New Mexico and Wyoming, however, cases and hospitalizations are near their lowest points ever.
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.