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Poll: Majority of Americans know someone who's had Covid-19

Thirty-four percent of adults say either they or someone in their households have been tested in the past month, according to the NBC News|Survey Monkey Weekly Tracking Poll.
Image: Coronavirus patient
Nurse Michele Younkin, left, comforts Romelia Navarro who weeps while sitting at the bedside of her dying husband, Antonio, in St. Jude Medical Center's Covid-19 unit in Fullerton, Calif., on July 31. Antonio Navarro was Younkin's first Covid-19 patient to die on her watch.Jae C. Hong / AP file

WASHINGTON — A majority of American adults say they know someone who has been diagnosed with Covid-19, according to new data from the NBC News|SurveyMonkey Weekly Tracking Poll.

Sixty-eight percent of adults say they know someone who has had the coronavirus since December, while 31 percent say they don't know someone who has been diagnosed with the virus. Thirty-four percent of adults say either they or someone in their household hse been tested for the coronavirus in the past month, while 64 percent say no one in their home has.

While older adults are more at risk of severe symptoms from Covid-19, there was little difference across age demographics when people were asked whether they know someone who had contracted the coronavirus. Sixty-five percent of adults ages 18 to 34 know someone who had the virus, 71 percent of Americans age 35 to 64 say the same and, in the most at-risk age category, 65 and older, 63 percent say they know someone who had been diagnosed.

The United States is experiencing spikes in the numbers of coronavirus cases, hospitalizations and deaths. The number of new daily coronavirus cases has stayed above 60,000 since Oct. 19, reaching a record 79,303 on Friday. Daily deaths have been increasing, too, hitting a recent high of 1,245 on Wednesday, according to NBC News data.

The national seven-day average of current hospitalized cases is also on the rise, according to The COVID Tracking Project, with current hospitalizations hitting 41,776 on Sunday, the highest since late August.

Despite President Donald Trump's rhetoric that increased testing is to blame for the spike in case numbers, there was nearly no discrepancy among people's getting tested when the data are broken down by party.

Thirty-three percent of Republicans and those who lean Republican report that either they or someone in their household has been tested for Covid-19 in the last 30 days; 36 percent of Democrats and those who lean Democratic say the same. Thirty-four percent of independents say they or someone in their home has been tested in the last month.

Sixty-six percent of Republican and those who lean Republican say they know someone who has been diagnosed, and 72 percent of Democrats and those who lean Democratic say they know someone who has contracted the disease. Sixty-one percent of independents say they know someone who has been diagnosed.

The same trend is true when it comes to people's income brackets and race.

Fifty-eight percent of adults who make under $50,000 a year say they know someone who has been diagnosed, and 34 percent say they or someone in their home has been tested in the last month. Among adults making $50,000 to $99,999, 71 percent say they know someone who has been diagnosed, and 33 percent say they or someone they live with has been tested in the last 30 days. And 78 percent of Americans making more than $100,000 a year say they know someone who has contracted Covid-19, and 37 percent of them say they or someone in their home has been tested in the last month.

Similarly, 69 percent of white adults report that they know someone who has been diagnosed, and 34 percent say either they or someone in their home has been tested in the last 30 days. Sixty-seven percent of Black adults and 67 percent of Hispanic adults say they know someone who has contracted the virus, while 36 percent of Black adults and 36 percent of Hispanics say they or someone in their home has been tested in the past month. Fifty-six percent of Asian adults say they know someone who has had the disease, and 32 percent say they or someone in their home has been tested in the last 30 days.

Other Covid-19-related numbers in the poll have remained stagnant — both as to how Americans view the virus and its effect on their lives and as to how they view Trump in relation to the virus.

Seventy-four percent of adults say the coronavirus has had a "very major" or "fairly major" effect on their daily lives — the same proportion who felt that way when asked two weeks ago.

Forty-four percent of adults say they approve of Trump's handling of the virus response, while 54 percent say they don't, a number that has remained virtually unchanged over months of NBC News|SurveyMonkey polling.

And 53 percent of adults are more concerned that businesses in their area are reopening too quickly, compared to 43 percent who are more concerned about a slower reopening, another number that has remained stable in recent weeks since a tightening in those numbers emerged in September.

Data come from a set of SurveyMonkey online polls conducted Oct. 19-25, 2020, among a national sample of 73,903 adults in the U.S. Respondents were selected from the more than 2 million people who take surveys on the SurveyMonkey platform each day. The modeled error estimate for this survey is plus or minus 1.0 percentage points. Data have been weighted for age, race, sex, education and geography using the Census Bureau's American Community Survey to reflect the demographic composition of the United States ages 18 and over.