A new map from the US Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC) shows the regions of the US where COVID-19 cases are increasing.

In the week ending Nov. 23, about 4.5 percent of COVID-19 patients nationwide were positive, an increase of 0.3 percent from the week before.

Some regions had higher test positivity rates than others, with a 6.3 percent positivity rate in Arkansas, Louisiana, New Mexico, Oklahoma and Texas.

In Colorado, Montana, North Dakota, South Dakota, Utah and Wyoming, the positivity rate was 5.7 percent; a rate of 4.6 percent in Illinois, Indiana, Iowa, Kansas, Michigan, Minnesota, Missouri, Nebraska, Ohio and Wisconsin; and a rate of 4 percent in Arizona, California, Hawaii and Nevada.

Additionally, Connecticut, Maine, Massachusetts, New Hampshire, Rhode Island and Vermont had a positivity rate of 3.9 percent; a rate of 3.4 percent in New Jersey and New York; and a rate of 3 percent in Delaware, D.C., Maryland, Pennsylvania, Virginia and West Virginia. All other remaining states had a test positivity rate of 2.5 percent.

CDC data shows that 0.5 percent of emergency room visits nationwide were related to COVID-19, down 1.3 percent from the week before. New Mexico had the highest rate of COVID-19-related emergency room visits at 1.6 percent, followed by Arizona at 1.5, South Dakota at 1.1 percent, North Dakota at 1.0 percent and Colorado at 0.9 percent .

COVID-19 nucleic acid amplification tests (NAATs), like PCR tests, detect the virus’s genetic material to determine whether someone is infected. The sample is first treated to extract the virus’s RNA, which is then converted into DNA using a special enzyme.

Many copies of a specific part of the virus’s DNA are then created using a process called amplification, which makes it easier to detect even tiny amounts of the virus. When the copies are made, a special dye lights up in the presence of the virus, signaling a positive result.

There were 161 deaths from COVID-19 in the week ending November 23, compared to 372 deaths the week before, and 485 deaths and 560 in the two weeks before that.

This comes as the CDC has found wastewater levels of SARS-CoV-2 – the virus that causes COVID-19 – in New Mexico to be “very high” and “high” for the period November 10-16, 2024. are. in Arizona, Kentucky, Minnesota, Oklahoma, Pennsylvania and South Dakota.

“SARS-CoV-2, the virus that causes COVID-19, is constantly changing and accumulating mutations in its genetic code over time. New variants of SARS-CoV-2 are expected to continue to emerge. “Some variants will emerge and disappear while others may emerge and continue to spread and replace previous variants,” the CDC said in a statement.

CDC data shows that in the two weeks leading up to November 23, the KP.3.1.1 subvariant accounted for 44 percent of total COVID infections, with the new XEC variant accounting for 38 percent and MC.1 totaling 6 percent.

This roughly corresponds to the variants found in wastewater on November 16, with KP.3.1.1 making up 34 percent, XEC 21 percent and KP.3 18 percent.

“There is no evidence and no particular reason to believe that XEC causes different symptoms than any other SARS-CoV-2 currently circulating,” Francois Balloux, a professor of computational systems biology at University College London in England, previously told Newsweek.

“XEC is not expected to cause any more (or less) severe symptoms than other lineages currently circulating.”

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