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As the COVID-19 pandemic battered large, metropolitan areas this spring, rural hospitals prepared to be next on the frontlines. But in order to ready their facilities for a potential surge in patients, those small hospitals had to forgo many of their most profitable operations. Months later, a few rural hospitals are fighting outbreaks. But others have empty beds, further threatening their viability in an era of shrinking health care options for people living in rural communities. (Simpson, 7/22)

Gov. Ron DeSantis has followed President Donald Trump’s lead for months while he waged a local battle against the coronavirus in Florida. That loyalty was rewarded with scorn from the White House this week as scrutiny on the state’s handling of Covid-19 ratchets up in the final months of the presidential campaign. Twice in two days, Trump and his aides have put the squeeze on DeSantis, a fellow Republican. (Dixon, 7/22)

In May, Massachusetts received the lowest amount of personal protective equipment from the federal government in the U.S. relative to its count of positive cases, according to an analysis of data gathered by The Associated Press and shared with WBUR and other news outlets. The AP's data examined how the Federal Emergency Management Agency distributed PPE across the U.S. (Willmsen, 7/23)

At least 13 nuns from a single convent in Livonia, Michigan, have died since the COVID-19 pandemic began nearly three months ago. A dozen nuns in the Congregation of the Sisters of St. Felix of Cantalice died after contracting the virus between April 10 and May 10, religious officials said. Another nun from the congregation died on June 27, according to the Global Sisters Report. (Allen, 7/22)

Iowa has surpassed 800 COVID-19 deaths, state health records showed Wednesday, as confirmed cases of the virus continued to climb. The state health department’s virus tracking site showed that as of 10 a.m. Wednesday, there had been 10 more deaths reported in the previous 24 hours. That brought the state’s total deaths to 808 since the beginning of the outbreak. The site also showed another 374 cases confirmed from Tuesday to Wednesday, bringing the state’s total to 39,793. (7/22)

When coronavirus cases reached 10,000 in Louisiana on April 3, Governor John Bel Edwards called it a “grim milestone.”  According to a new study from federal researchers, the real case count in those early days of the state's outbreak was actually much grimmer. By early April, there were at least 267,000 people infected with the coronavirus in Louisiana, or about one out of every 17 residents, according to research from the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention, which was published earlier this week in JAMA Internal Medicine. (Woodruff, 7/22)

Mississippi’s leaders continued to express concern Wednesday over the impact that rapidly increasing cases of coronavirus and hospitalizations will have on the state’s health care system. The Mississippi State Department of Health reported that 490 people were hospitalized with COVID-19 on June 27, followed by 602 on July 1. On Wednesday, 942 people were hospitalized with the virus. (Willingham, 7/22)