Here’s the Tri-Cities town with the highest coronavirus case rate this week

Pasco, the second largest of the three Tri-Cities, continues to have the most known cases of COVID-19.

It has 555 cases, compared to 492 in Kennewick.

Richland has 168.

Totals are from the start of the pandemic.

Pasco and Kennewick each have had 47 new cases identified in the last week while Richland has had just nine.

The Benton Franklin Health District releases updated information on known cases on Tuesday afternoons.

Pasco also has the highest rate of known cases among the three Tri-Cities.

It has 74 known cases per 10,000 residents, using the U.S. Census Bureau’s 2018 estimate.

Kennewick has 59 known cases per 10,000 people, and Richland has 29 known cases per 10,000.

West Richland has close to the Richland rate with 30 known cases per 10,000. Its case total increased by five over the last week to 45.

Prosser had 10 more cases reported in the past week, for a total of 58.

That’s a rate of 92 cases per 10,000 people, although that rate could be influenced by the amount of testing for COVID-19 being done in Prosser which could differ from number of people being testing n the Tri-Cities.

There have been continuing shortages of testing materials that have limited the scale of the testing depending on the area, and is sometimes influenced by whether communities have active outbreaks.

The testing of all Tyson Fresh Meats workers may have influenced the rate of known cases in the Tri-Cities. Testing found 251 people who commute to the the Wallula beef plant from the Tri-Cities area were positive for infection with the new coronavirus.

Pasco is closest to that plant.

COVID-19 deaths

Although known cases are higher in Pasco than Kennewick or Richland, the opposite appears to be true for deaths from complications of COVID-19.

Franklin County, where Pasco is its largest city, has had 17 deaths linked to COVID-19.

Benton County — where Kennewick and Richland are the largest cities — has had 58 deaths.

The local health district say the difference is because Kennewick and Richland have most of the retirement communities and long-term care homes in the Tri-Cities.

About 70 percent of deaths in the Tri-Cities have been linked to senior communities.

Other towns with at least 10 known COVID-19 cases include Connell with 14. It had less than 10 a week ago.

Benton City still has 16 known cases and Eltopia still has 11.

The Benton Franklin Health District does not release case totals by town if they are fewer than 10 cases to protect the privacy of small town residents.

The health district has reported 1,397 known cases in the two counties as of Tuesday.