Please note that all figures below are subject to uncertainty and the assumptions in our model. They are likely to change as we incorporate more data and update and improve our model. For more information on process for updating our model, please see our SEIR and Hospitalization modeling details pages.

Current Snapshot

Our most recent update (using data from October 15, 2021) estimated that the Effective Reproduction Number (Rt, the average number of people infected by each infected person)1 is currently equal to 2.52 in North Carolina.

Currently, we estimate that 66,062 people are infected with SARS-CoV-2 and 36,122 of those people are infectious. To date, we estimate that 3,941,952 people have been infected with SARS-CoV-2 (37.53% of all residents), 3,648,135 people have gained immunity via vaccination (34.78% of all residents), and 2,879,766 people remain susceptible to SARS-CoV-2 infection (27.46% of all residents) in North Carolina. We estimate that 44.11% of people who were infected with SARS-CoV-2 were lab confirmed in the last week.

For details on some milestone events and dates since COVID-19 was detected in North Carolina, visit our Timeline page.

Reopening Metrics

Visit the official NCDHHS page for more information about the metrics and North Carolina’s phased reopening plan.

COVID-like Illness

Sustained leveling or decreased trajectory in COVID-like illness (CLI) surveillance over 14 days

Data are not available. Visit NCDHHS’ weekly COVID-19 Surveillance page

Lab-confirmed Cases

Sustained leveling or decreased trajectory of lab-confirmed cases over 14 days

Data date: 10/2 - 10/15
Trend: -92.4 cases per day
Trajectory: DECREASING

Positive Test Percentage

Sustained leveling or decreased trajectory in the percentage of tests returning positive over 14 days

Data date: 9/30 - 10/14
Trend: -0.157% per day
Trajectory: DECREASING

People Hospitalized

Sustained leveling or decreased trajectory in number of people hospitalized over 14 days

Data date: 10/1 - 10/15
Trend: -56.8 people (in hospital) per day
Trajectory: DECREASING

  1. Because we are referring a dynamic variable that changes over time, we use the term “Effective Reproduction Number” and symbol “Rt” rather than the term “Basic Reproduction Number” and symbol “R0”. See this article for more information. Also, see NPR Goats and Soda’s “Essential Vocab For COVID-19: From Asymptomatic To Zoonotic” to learn even more!↩︎

For questions, email us at nc-covid@unc.edu