COVID-19 in Pennsylvania: The latest data and charts

• Lisa Wardle
  BioRecent Stories

  

  Lisa is the Digital Manager at WITF. She works with reporters, editors and our audience to create engaging content for digital platforms.
  
  She previously worked as an entertainment reporter and digital producer at PennLive/The Patriot-News, a copy editor at The Sentinel and a writer for a pet industry magazine.
• Scott Blanchard
  BioRecent Stories

  

  Scott Blanchard is Director of Journalism at WITF and oversees StateImpact Pennsylvania, an award-winning public media collaboration among WITF, WHYY in Philadelphia, and The Allegheny Front in Pittsburgh that covers the state’s energy economy.
  
  Blanchard was named StateImpact editor in 2017, and in 2021 became senior editor for WITF and StateImpact. He was named WITF's journalism director in February 2022. Previously, he was enterprise editor at the York (Pa.) Daily Record, where he led the newsroom’s investigative and projects reporting. He was a 2013 Ochberg Fellow, receiving training at Columbia University in PTSD science, self-help and peer support. He is a past president of the Pennsylvania Society of News Editors. A Rockville, Md., native, he is a graduate of the University of Missouri’s journalism school.

WITF’s news team will update this page regularly with the latest information about cases, hospitalizations, deaths and vaccinations.

Vaccines

The Food and Drug Administration has authorized two-dose COVID-19 vaccines produced by Pfizer and Moderna for emergency use, as well as a single-dose shot from Johnson and Johnson. Pennsylvania began distributing the first vaccines in December 2020.

The commonwealth is currently in Phase 2 of the rollout. All Pennsylvanians ages 12 and older are eligible.

Learn more and find providers on the Department of Health’s website.

Your community

The chart below shows approximate risk levels based on the incidence rate in central Pennsylvania counties. This is the average number of new cases reported each day, per 100,000 residents, and is calculated as a seven-day average to smooth out any spikes or valleys in reported data. Learn more about these risk levels.

Five weeks are included to show how counties’ case counts are changing over time.

Overall trends

The Pennsylvania Department of Health reported its first cases of COVID-19 on March 6, 2020. Cases in the commonwealth peaked in December 2020, with a record 12,884 new cases reported on Dec. 5. Additional waves can be seen in spring 2021 and the current late summer 2021 wave, fueled by the delta variant.

State officials added 5,227 old test results to the official tally on Aug. 25, 2021. Those cases occurred throughout the pandemic and should not be considered new cases, though they are included with the Aug. 25 count because they cannot be attributed elsewhere. This spike will briefly skew the seven-day average.

Click the arrows below to see how the number of positive tests and deaths have changed over time.