Alaska COVID-19 Data Summary: Sept. 7, 2021

COVID-19 DATA SUMMARY – Sept. 7, 2021

Reporting data for 12 a.m. - 11:59 p.m. Sept. 3-6, 2021

OVERVIEW – 2,148 new cases | 2 deaths | 186 hospitalizations | Statewide alert level: high | 55.7% of Alaskans 12+ vaccinated

TAKE ACTION – Choosing to get vaccinated is the single most important action you can take to protect yourself and your community and to keep our economy strong. Learn more about the vaccines at covidvax.alaska.gov and the CDC’s recommendations for fully vaccinated people at www.cdc.gov/coronavirus/2019-ncov/vaccines/fully-vaccinated.html.

VACCINATIONS – 61.3% of Alaskans age 12 and older have received at least their first vaccine dose.

55.7% of Alaskans 12 and older have been fully vaccinated. The higher the vaccination rate, the more protected community members are from COVID-19. See below for percentages of all fully vaccinated Alaskans age 12 and older by region:

• Juneau Region: 79%
• Other Southeast Region - Northern: 74.4%
• YK-Delta Region: 73%
• Southwest Region: 66%
• Other Southeast Region - Southern: 64.6%
• Northwest Region: 61.5%
• Anchorage Region: 57.8%
• Other Interior Region: 56.3%
• Fairbanks North Star Borough: 49%
• Kenai Peninsula Region: 47.2%
• Matanuska-Susitna Region: 39.2%

CASES – DHSS today announced two deaths of Alaska residents and 2,148 new people identified with COVID-19 in Alaska over the past four days. 

• Sept. 3 – 850 residents, 38 nonresidents
• Sept. 4 – 504 residents, 28 nonresidents
• Sept. 5 – 273 residents, 12 nonresidents
• Sept. 6 – 432 residents, 11 nonresidents

2,059 were residents of: Anchorage (542), Fairbanks (233), Wasilla (223), Palmer (122), Utqiaġvik (96), Kenai (89), Juneau (75), North Pole (61), Soldotna (56), Bethel Census Area (52), Ketchikan (49), Eagle River (43), Homer (42), Dillingham Census Area (26), Kodiak (24), Big Lake (20), North Slope Borough (18), Dillingham (16), Northwest Arctic Borough (16), Sterling (15), Yukon-Koyukuk Census Area (15), Bethel (14), Chugiak (14), Kenai Peninsula Borough North (14), Seward (13), Willow (10), Fairbanks North Star Borough (9), Haines (9), Copper River Census Area (8), Delta Junction (8), Kenai Peninsula Borough South (8), Kusilvak Census Area (8), Nome Census Area (8), Prince Of Wales-Hyder Census Area (8), Valdez (8), Matanuska-Susitna Borough (7), Nikiski (7), Sitka (7), Craig (6), Anchor Point (5), Hooper Bay (5), Sutton-Alpine (5), Unalaska (5), Wrangell (5), Douglas (4), Houston (4), Kotzebue (4), Cordova (3), Girdwood (3), Aleutians East Borough (2), Bristol Bay plus Lake and Peninsula (2), Kodiak Island Borough (2), Salcha (2), Tok (2), and one each in Chevak, Chugach Census Area, Denali Borough, Healy, Nome, Skagway and Yakutat plus Hoonah-Angoon.

89 new nonresident cases were identified in:

• Anchorage: 1 airline pilot, 1 in 'other' industry, 24 with purposes under investigation
• Fairbanks: 7 with purposes under investigation
• Denali Borough: 3 in tourism, 3 with purposes under investigation
• Soldotna: 1 in 'other' industry, 3 with purposes under investigation
• Unalaska: 4 with purposes under investigation
• Seward: 3 with purposes under investigation
• Sitka: 3 in tourism
• Skagway: 3 in tourism
• Wasilla: 3 with purposes under investigation
• Delta Junction: 2 with purposes under investigation
• Juneau: 2 with purposes under investigation
• Kenai: 2 with purposes under investigation
• North Slope Borough: 2 with purposes under investigation
• Palmer: 2 in 'other' industry
• Bethel: 1 with purpose under investigation
• Cordova: 1 in 'other' industry
• Homer: 1 with purpose under investigation
• Kenai Peninsula Borough South: 1 with purpose under investigation
• Kodiak: 1 in 'other' industry
• Kodiak Island Borough: 1 in 'other' industry
• Prince of Wales-Hyder Census Area: 1 with purpose under investigation
• Yukon-Koyukuk Census Area: 1 with purpose under investigation
• Locations under investigation: 1 in tourism, 11 with purposes under investigation

One resident case was added to, and one nonresident case was subtracted from the cases dashboard due to data verification procedures bringing the total number of Alaska resident cases to 88,658 and the total number of nonresident cases to 4,132.

HOSPITALIZATIONS & DEATHS – There have been a total of 2,059 resident hospitalizations and 437 deaths. Over the past four days there were 17 new resident hospitalizations and two new Alaska resident deaths reported.

Both deaths were recent:

• A male Fairbanks North Star Borough resident in his 50s
• A female Kusilvak Census Area resident in her 60s

Our thoughts are with the families and loved ones of the individuals who died.

There are currently 186 patients diagnosed with COVID-19 who are hospitalized and 10 additional patients who are considered persons under investigation (PUI) for a total of 196 current COVID-related hospitalizations. Twenty-three of these patients are on ventilators. The percentage of patients currently hospitalized with COVID-19 is 17.5%.

TESTING – A total of 2,807,864 tests have been conducted, with 45,465 tests conducted in the previous seven days. The average percentage of daily positive tests for the previous seven days is 8.07%.

ALERT LEVELS - The current statewide alert level – based on the reported number of cases per 100,000 people over the past 7 days – is high (red) at 558.0. For boroughs and census areas: 27 areas are at the high alert level (>100 cases), 1 area is at the substantial alert level (50-99.99), 0 areas are at the moderate alert level (10-49.99) and 0 areas are at the low alert level (0-9.99).

Find alert levels for individual boroughs and census areas using the alert levels map on the cases dashboard at experience.arcgis.com/experience/2d19dc2b5c7e4b399ff6495a8950493d/

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. Personnel continue to focus on the effort to process and count reports and minimize the delay from receipt to posting on the 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. Current hospitalizations are reported for all facilities, not just general acute care and critical access facilities. 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.