To date, 88,027,926 Americans are confirmed to have been infected with COVID-19 — and over 1 million have died as a result. On a per capita basis, the U.S. has one of the highest known infections rates in the world.

In the Rapid City metropolitan area, located in South Dakota, a total of 44,305 COVID-19 cases have been reported to date. Adjusted for population, there have been 30,494 reported infections for every 100,000 people in the area — above the national rate of 26,906 cases per 100,000 people.

Though per capita cases of COVID-19 are higher in Rapid City than they are nationwide, some parts of the metro area are safer than others.

The broader Rapid City metro area comprises three counties or county equivalents — and of them, Custer County in South Dakota has the fewest COVID-19 cases per capita. So far, there have been a total of 2,200 confirmed infections in Custer County, or 25,662 for every 100,000 people.

Though Custer County has the lowest per capita infection rate in the Rapid City metro area, its per capita fatality rate is closely in line with the regional average.

There have been a total of 303 coronavirus-related deaths for every 100,000 people in Custer County, compared to 301 COVID-19 deaths per 100,000 across the entire Rapid City metro area.

All COVID-19 data used in this story are current as of July 17, 2022.

These are all the counties in South Dakota where COVID-19 is slowing (and where it’s still getting worse).

Rank	Geography	COVID cases per 100,000 people	Total cases	Deaths per 100,000 people	Total deaths
1	Custer County, SD	25,662	2,200	303	26
2	Meade County, SD	26,987	7,401	233	64
3	Pennington County, SD	31,753	34,704	318	348

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