Data reveal complex picture between colleges and county COVID-19 case counts

An extensive review of county-level COVID-19 case data in the United States reveals a complicated picture that in some ways challenges popular narratives about the role colleges and universities played in the pandemic’s spread, and in other ways reinforces them. In short, U.S. counties containing colleges and universities have from the very beginning been home to the majority of new coronavirus cases detected. That’s in part to be expected -- these counties are home to about 90 percent...