Credit: (AP Photo/Seth Wenig) A sign at the entrance to a park warns pedestrians about increased risk for COVID-19 in the Ironbound section of Newark, Essex County. Health outcomes have long varied significantly among New Jersey’s 21 counties, and experts say it is no surprise that COVID-19 has taken a greater toll on communities traditionally home to less healthy populations. In fact, some of the counties near the bottom of the latest County Health Rankings & Roadmaps report, an annual public health resource funded by the Robert Wood Johnson Foundation and created by the University of Wisconsin Population Health Institute, have some of the highest COVID-19-related death rates in New Jersey, according to an NJ Spotlight News review of state data.