Covid Trends in America

Esri's Which Way Are Things Going interactive map visualizes the week on week trend in Covid-19 cases at the county level. The map can show you at a glance whether the number of cases in your area has risen or fallen in the last week.The map can therefore help you to quickly assess whether things are getting better of worse in your county.

The color and direction of the arrow symbols on the map indicate whether Covid-19 cases have fallen or risen. Purple colored arrows pointing up indicate that cases have risen. Orange arrows pointing down show that cases have gone down in the last week. The size of the arrows show the rate of the increase or decrease in cases. If an arrow points straight up or straight down then it shows that cases have been rising or falling for nearly eight weeks in a row.

Using arrow symbols can be a very effective way to show the direction of travel for trends on a map. For example the New York Times used colored arrows after last year's presidential election to visualize the shift in the numbers voting for the Republican or Democratic candidate in an electoral district since the previous election in 2016. The arrows in the Shift from 2016 map view in Presidential Election Results 2020 show whether electoral districts have moved left or right politically since 2016.