Alaska COVID-19 Case Count Summary: Nov. 28, 2020

Alaska DOH sent this bulletin at 11/28/2020 01:36 PM AKST

Daily Case Count Update

CASE COUNT SUMMARY, Saturday, Nov. 28, 2020

DHSS today announced two new deaths and 656 new people identified with COVID-19 in Alaska. 639 were residents in:  Anchorage (262),  Wasilla (91), Bethel Census Area (55), Fairbanks (37),  Palmer (29), Chugiak (16), Soldotna (16), Eagle River (13), Kenai (12), Kodiak (11), Nome (10), Kusilvak Census Area (8),  Juneau (7), North Pole (7), Sitka (7),  Utqiaġvik (7) Bethel (6), Kenai Peninsula Borough North (4), Sterling (4), Yukon-Koyukuk Census Area (4), Delta Junction (3), Kotzebue (3), Big Lake (2), Chevak (2), Dillingham (2), Homer (2), North Slope Borough (2), Northwest Arctic Borough (2), Seward (2), and one each in Denali Borough, Fritz Creek, Girdwood, Houston, Ketchikan, Kodiak Island Borough, Nikiski, Petersburg, Prince of Wales-Hyder Census Area, Sutton-Alpine, Unalaska, Valdez-Cordova Census Area and Yakutat & Hoonah-Angoon combined. 

17 new nonresident cases were identified yesterday:

  • Seven in Anchorage with purpose under investigation
  • Five in Southeast Fairbanks Census Area with purpose in mining
  • One in Fairbanks with purpose under investigation
  • One in Wasilla with purpose in tourism
  • Two with location and purpose under investigation 
  • One with location under investigation with purpose "other"

Eleven resident cases were added and one nonresident case was added to the dashboard through data verification procedures. This brings the total number of Alaska resident cases to 30,204 and the total number of nonresident cases to 1,240.

ALERT LEVELS – The current statewide alert level, based on the average daily case rate over 14 days per 100,000, is high at 79.87 cases per 100,000. All regions in Alaska except for one are in high alert status with widespread community transmission occurring.

High (>10 cases/100,000)

  • YK-Delta Region: 166.14 cases per 100,000
  • Anchorage Municipality: 108.45 cases per 100,000
  • Kenai Peninsula Borough: 104.02 cases per 100,000
  • Other Interior Region: 62.45 cases per 100,000
  • Matanuska-Susitna Region: 62.34 cases per 100,000
  • Northwest Region: 50.25 cases per 100,000
  • Fairbanks North Star Borough: 42.46 cases per 100,000
  • Southwest Region: 41.28 cases per 100,000
  • Other Southeast Region - Northern: 25.49 cases per 100,000
  • Juneau City and Borough: 23.67 cases per 100,000

Intermediate (5-10 cases/100,000)

  • Other Southeast Region - Southern: 9.68 cases per 100,000

CASES: SEX & AGES – Of the 639 Alaska residents, 325 are male and 312 are female and two are unknown. 43 are under the age of 10; 85 are aged 10-19; 121 are aged 20-29; 119 are aged 30-39; 109 are aged 40-49; 74 are aged 50-59; 53 are aged 60-69; 26 are aged 70-79 and nine are aged 80 or older.

CASES: HOSPITALIZATIONS & DEATHS – There have been a total of 706 hospitalizations and 120 deaths, with 28 new hospitalizations and two new deaths reported yesterday. Our thoughts are with the family and loved ones of the individuals who died. 

Recent deaths:

  • a female Anchorage resident in her 70s
  • a female Anchorage resident aged 80+

There are currently 141 patients diagnosed with COVID-19 who are hospitalized and 12 additional patients who are considered persons under investigation (PUI) for a total of 153 current COVID-related hospitalizations. Twenty-five of these patients are on ventilators. The percentage of patients currently hospitalized with COVID-19 is 17.1%.

TESTING – A total of 999,054 tests have been conducted, with 27,518 tests conducted in the previous seven days. The average percentage of daily positive tests for the previous seven days is 6.9%. 

Notes: Cases reported to the Section of Epidemiology are increasing. Reports are received electronically, by phone and by fax. Cases are verified, redundancies are eliminated and then cases are entered into the data system that feeds into Alaska’s Coronavirus Response Hub. Because of the number of reports being received, it may take a day or two after receipt to get a report entered and counted. Extra personnel continue to focus on the effort to process and count reports and minimize the delay from receipt to posting on the Hub. Daily case counts seem likely to remain at this level or higher for the near future.

This report reflects data from 12 a.m. until 11:59 p.m. on Nov. 27 that posted at noon today on the Alaska Coronavirus Response Hub. There is a lag between cases being reported on the DHSS data dashboard and what local communities report. Each case is an individual person even if they are tested multiple times. Total tests are a not a count of unique individuals tested and includes both positive and negative results. The current number of hospitalized patients represents more real-time data compared to the cumulative total hospitalizations. Total number of hospital beds available fluctuate daily as the number of available hospital staff changes. All data reported in real-time, on a daily basis, should be considered preliminary and subject to change. To view more data visit: data.coronavirus.alaska.gov.