Alaska COVID-19 Case Count Summary: Jan. 2, 2021

CASE COUNT SUMMARY, Saturday, Jan. 2, 2021

DHSS today announced 300 new people identified with COVID-19 in Alaska. 298 were residents in: Anchorage (92), Fairbanks (47), Wasilla (21), Bethel Census Area (20), Eagle River (20), Palmer (12), Kusilvak Census Area (11), Soldotna (9), Juneau (8), North Pole (7), Utqiaġvik (7), Bethel (5), Chugiak (5), Kenai (5), Kodiak (5), Valdez-Cordova Census Area - Copper River (5), Dillingham Census Area (4), Homer (2), Kenai Peninsula Borough South (2), Nome (2), Sterling (2) and one each in Fairbanks North Star Borough, Kotzebue, Matanuska-Susitna Borough, Nome Census Area, Northwest Arctic Borough, Unalaska, Yakutat/Hoonah-Angoon.

Two new nonresident cases were identified yesterday in Unalaska with purposes under investigation.

Ten resident cases and one nonresident case were subtracted from the dashboard through data verification procedures bringing the total number of Alaska resident cases to 46,262 and the total number of nonresident cases to 1,539. 

ALERT LEVELS - The daily case rate over 14 days per 100,000, is high at 37.28 cases per 100,000. Most regions of Alaska are in high alert status.  Two regions are at intermediate alert status.  Widespread community transmission is occurring.

High (>10 cases/100,000)

• YK-Delta Region: 107.23 cases per 100,000
• Matanuska-Susitna Region: 44.16 cases per 100,000
• Southwest Region: 42.02 cases per 100,000
• Anchorage Municipality: 41.41 cases per 100,000
• Fairbanks North Star Borough: 32.03 cases per 100,000
• Northwest Region: 25.26 cases per 100,000
• Kenai Peninsula Borough: 24.11 cases per 100,000
• Other Interior Region: 22.54 cases per 100,000
• Juneau City and Borough: 14.29 cases per 100,000

Intermediate (>4.8-10 cases/100,000)

• Other Southeast Region - Northern: 6.64 cases per 100,000
• Other Southeast Region - Southern: 6.45 cases per 100,000

CASES: SEX & AGES – Of the 298 Alaska residents, 159 are male and 139 are female. 24 are under the age of 10; 41 are aged 10-19; 65 are aged 20-29; 53 are aged 30-39; 36 are aged 40-49; 39 are aged 50-59; 23 are aged 60-69; nine are aged 70-79 and eight are aged 80 or older.

CASES: HOSPITALIZATIONS & DEATHS – There have been a total of 1,010 hospitalizations and 214 deaths, with two new hospitalizations and no new deaths reported yesterday. 

There are currently 63 patients diagnosed with COVID-19 who are hospitalized and six additional patients who are considered persons under investigation (PUI) for a total of 69 current COVID-related hospitalizations. Six of these patients are on ventilators. The percentage of patients currently hospitalized with COVID-19 is 8.9%.

TESTING – A total of 1,290,349 tests have been conducted, with 29,603 tests conducted in the previous seven days. The average percentage of daily positive tests for the previous seven days is 5.22%. 

COVID-19 VACCINATIONS: To date, there have been 13,722 dose #1 COVID-19 vaccinations given in Alaska. For more information, visit the Vaccine Monitoring Dashboard. 

TAKE ACTION – Vaccines are being distributed throughout Alaska but we all still need to maintain our COVID-19 protective measures to keep ourselves and others safe and healthy: coronavirus.dhss.alaska.gov

Notes: 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. When there is a high number of reports being received, this may cause delays in getting reports 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. 

This report reflects data from 12 a.m. until 11:59 p.m. on Jan. 1. 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. Current hospitalizations are reported for all facilities, not just general acute care and critical access facilities, as is the default on the dashboard. 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; weekly and daily case summaries are archived at dhss.alaska.gov/dph/Epi/id/Pages/COVID-19/communications.aspx#updates.