Coronavirus Spread In Hennepin County: See Your Risk Of Exposure

HENNEPIN COUNTY, MN — Recent data shows that Minnesota may be at the end of the recent coronavirus surge that resulted in a spike of COVID-19 cases, hospitalizations, and deaths.

On Tuesday, the state reported 21 deaths and 2,340 new cases. Cases have been generally on the decline since they reached a daily peak of 8,743 on Nov. 9. Deaths have also been trending down since 101 were reported on Nov. 27.

Hospitals remain near capacity throughout the state, however. In the Twin Cities metro, more than 95 percent of ICU beds are in use.

And with the virus still well above levels deemed "controllable," state health experts continue to urge the use of masking and social distancing.

What is your risk of exposure?

Researchers from several universities have created an event risk planning tool for every county in the nation. The map shows the risk of coronavirus transmission based on an event's size and location.

A new tool shows the estimated chance — between 0 and 100 percent — that you'll encounter at least one person with the coronavirus at an event in your county. You can reduce the risk by wearing a mask, distancing, and gathering outdoors in smaller groups, researchers said.

As of Tuesday, if you were to attend an event with 15 people in Hennepin County, there would be a 41 percent chance that someone at the event would have the virus, according to the COVID-19 Event Risk Assessment Planning Tool.

If you hang out with ten people, the chance drops to 30 percent.

Two Georgia Institute of Technology professors led the creation of the project, and their team included researchers from Stanford University and the Applied Bioinformatics Laboratory.

"By default we assume there are five times more cases than are being reported," the research team said in a statement. "In places with less testing availability, that bias may be higher."

Use the COVID-19 "Event Risk Assessment Planning Tool" here.

Amber Fisher, Patch Staff, contributed to this report