A real rural future

The COVID-19 pandemic dispersed many Americans across the nation. And today, cities are not dominant in the hearts and minds of Americans whatsoever. In reality, not only are most Americans more interested in living in rural areas than in big cities, but many living in rural areas are quite optimistic about the future and still believe in the power of hard work.

 COVID Racial Disparities Loom Large in Rural Counties

Compared with their urban and suburban counterparts, the 60 million residents of rural America have limited access to health care. Rural hospital closures and a lack of affordable health insurance exacerbate the problem. Rural residents, on average, tend to be older, poorer and sicker or have underlying health conditions, all of which contribute to higher COVID-19 mortality rates.

 COVID-19 and rural communities: Protecting rural lives and health

The COVID-19 pandemic has cast a spotlight on racial and ethnic health inequities. While there is a growing body of research on the disproportionate impact of the COVID-19 pandemic on racial and ethnic minorities, the inequities in racially and ethnically diverse rural communities have largely been overlooked.

 Equitable Recovery and Resilience in Rural America

Rural America is a special place – or more accurately a mosaic of many special places – where connection to the land is the defining characteristic, reinforced by history, culture and lived experiences.

 Impacts of the COVID-19 pandemic on rural America

Rural people have been left out of the vast majority of research on the impacts of the COVID-19 pandemic. As such, our evidence-based understanding of the pandemic in the United States is incomplete, and rural recovery policies risk being informed by anecdotal or urban-centric information.

 Op-Ed: New Year, New Hope for Rural America in the Fight Against COVID

Rural America is not a monolith. The diversity across rural America is as rich and expansive as our country itself. We can’t expect to move the needle with a single act or message. Combined efforts like the one NRHA and COVID Collaborative are proud to help lead aim to meet rural Americans where they are through their trusted healthcare and medical leaders, houses of worship, the agricultural community, and the small business community.

 Patients Drive Hours to ERs as Omicron Variant Overwhelms Rural Hospitals

In rural America, the problem is worse. One or two missing workers can shut down an entire clinic. Now many are out sick with Omicron. Many rural facilities say they can’t afford to hire travel nurses at rates that have skyrocketed during the pandemic. And some clinics and family practices that typically provide care that can keep people from landing at hospitals are closing because Omicron has hobbled their workforces, too.

 Too Many Rural Americans Are Living In the Digital Dark. The Problem Demands A New Deal Solution

The lack of broadband in rural areas is one of the most striking inequalities in US society. Due to the lack of broadband availability, tens of millions of rural Americans aren’t able to “see” their doctor over the internet in the same way urban Americans can.

‘Our hands are tied’: US coronavirus surge ravages small rural hospitals

The tragedies brought on by coronavirus in small towns where everyone knows everyone are more intimate and heartbreaking.

After generations of disinvestment, rural America might be the most innovative place in the U.S.

COVID-19 has not just exposed the challenges faced in rural America; it has made plain that there is no longer comfort in believing there is time to find eventual solutions.

Coronavirus Is Bad in the Cities. It Could Be Even Worse Outside of Them

Shortages in hospital staff, equipment, and space could force doctors in rural regions of the U.S. to begin the kind of unthinkable rationing decisions that have been reported in Italy.

Covid Is Killing Rural Americans at Twice the Rate of Urbanites

Rural Americans are dying of covid at more than twice the rate of their urban counterparts — a divide that health experts say is likely to widen as access to medical care shrinks for a population that tends to be older, sicker, heavier, poorer and less vaccinated.

Covid is killing rural Americans at twice the rate of urbanites

Pre-pandemic, rural Americans had 20% higher overall death rates than those who live in urban areas, due to their lower rates of insurance, higher rates of poverty, and more limited access to healthcare, according to 2019 data from the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention’s National Center for Health Statistics.

Examining the Impact of the COVID-19 Pandemic on the Rural American West

While much has been written about the impact of the COVID-19 pandemic on urban centers and suburbs across the United States, less discussed is its impact on rural America, specifically the rural West. The Rural West Covid Project, led by Justin Farrell, associate professor of sociology at the Yale School of the Environment, aims to close that data gap and provide policymakers and others with new information on rural Westerners’ response to the COVID-19 pandemic.

Faith, Freedom, Fear: Rural America’s Covid Vaccine Skeptics

Resistance is widespread in white, Republican communities like this one in Appalachia. But it’s far more complicated than just a partisan divide.

Getting COVID-19 vaccines to rural Americans is harder than it looks – but there are ways to lift the barriers

Getting the word to rural residents about when they can be vaccinated isn’t easy either, and the extraordinary amount of misinformation downplaying the risk of the coronavirus this past year has had an impact on rural residents’ willingness to get the vaccine.

How The COVID-19 Coronavirus Pandemic Is Impacting Rural America

As rural healthcare facilities are bracing for the onset of the Coronavirus (COVID-19), the public health issues in rural America in dealing with this pandemic are proving to be complicated and deeply frustrating for a variety of reasons.

Rural America is more vulnerable to COVID-19 than cities are, and it’s starting to show

Rural areas seemed immune as the coronavirus spread through cities earlier this year. Few rural cases were reported, and attention focused on the surge of illnesses and deaths in the big metro areas. But that false sense of safety is now falling apart as infection rates explode in rural areas across the country.

Rural Americans Stopped Staying In. Then Covid-19 Hit

Coronavirus cases rise to record highs and hospitalizations surge as people return to some semblance of normality.

Rural hospitals are under siege from COVID-19 – here’s what doctors are facing, in their own words

Rural health care systems entered the pandemic in already precarious financial positions. Over the years, shifting demographics, declining revenue and increasing operating expenses have made it harder for rural hospitals to stay in business. The pandemic has made it even more difficult.

Shuttered hospitals, soaring Covid-19 deaths: Rural Black communities lose a lifeline in the century’s worst health crisis

“The populations that these rural hospitals serve are a sicker population and in many cases a lower-income population,” said Morgan of the National Rural Health Association. Failing to provide proper care only escalates costs in the long run. “The data shows there’s a race factor here.”

The coronavirus may hit rural America later — and harder

Rural communities “tend to be older, with more chronic illness,” making people more at risk of severe Covid-19.

Vaccinated seniors navigate life in mostly unvaccinated rural America

There is plenty of vaccine reluctance, if not outright outright defiance, in Loennig's hometown of Baker City, Ore., the historic first stop on the old Oregon Trail in the heart of the state's deeply rural and conservative eastern side.

Who Actually Gets to Shrug Off COVID

Yes, some of the divide is geographical. But it’s not as stark or simple as a recent Atlantic article supposes.

‘Delta has been brutal’: Covid-19 variant is decimating rural areas already reeling from the pandemic

Health inequities in rural communities across the South are continuing to determine who is most vulnerable to Covid-19 now that the Delta variant is bringing a new surge in deaths.