The test positivity rate is the percentage of COVID tests that come back positive out of all the tests conducted in a state. On an Oct. 1 episode of the ABC News podcast Start Here, Fauci explained that “everybody wants to be around 1 percent or less” in terms of test positivity rate. He continued, “2 percent, OK; 3 percent… when you get up to 5 [percent], to 10 [percent], you really got a problem.” The World Health Organization (WHO) advises countries that before reopening, positive test rates should be 5 percent or lower for at least two weeks. Currently, 28 states in the U.S., plus Puerto Rico, are above that threshold, according to COVID data from Johns Hopkins University (JHU). In his conversation with Wired, Fauci added, “When you look at the hot spots of transmission, when you’ve seen people crowded in bars with no masks, that’s when you start to see the uptick of test positivity, which leads to increased cases, and then increased hospitalizations.” A high test positivity rate in a given area could mean that the ratio of positive tests is too high (which indicates there’s significant community spread) or that the number of tests being administered is too low, according to JHU. In early August, when COVID was finally starting to loosen its grip on the Sun Belt states, Fauci said an increase in test positivity was becoming a red flag in Midwestern states. “Prior to the surging, you could detect an early increase in the percent positive for any given state,” Fauci told Howard Bauchner, MD, editor in chief of the Journal of the American Medical Association (JAMA). “It’s a good predictor of a surge.” Now, two months later, it appears the head of the National Institute of Allergy and Infectious Diseases (NIAID) was right. Four of the five biggest COVID outbreaks in the U.S. are currently in Midwest, according to data from the Harvard Global Health Institute. Read on to learn more about where COVID is surging and for another state on Fauci’s radar, check out Dr. Fauci Says This One State Is"Asking for Trouble." Daily new case rate: 29.4 per 100 residents Test positivity rate: 17.2 percent Daily new case rate: 40.1 per 100 residentsae0fcc31ae342fd3a1346ebb1f342fcb Test positivity rate: 21.1 percent And for further information on the situation in Wisconsin, check out The White House Just Told This State to Use “Maximal Social Distancing.” Daily new case rate: 45.3 per 100 residents Test positivity rate: 25.9 percent And for regular COVID updates, sign up for our daily newsletter. Daily new case rate: 54.2 per 100 residents Test positivity rate: 7.54 percent And for more on North Dakota, check out This Hard-Hit State Has By Far the Worst COVID Outbreak in the Country.
