Alaska COVID-19 Data Summary: Sept. 8, 2021

COVID-19 DATA SUMMARY – Sept. 8, 2021

Reporting data for 12 a.m. - 11:59 p.m. Sept. 7, 2021

OVERVIEW – 841 new cases | 6 deaths | 197 hospitalizations | Statewide alert level: high | 55.8% 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 – 61.4% of Alaskans age 12 and older have received at least their first vaccine dose.

55.8% 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: 79.1%
• Other Southeast Region - Northern: 74.5%
• YK-Delta Region: 73.1%
• Southwest Region: 66.2%
• Other Southeast Region - Southern: 64.7%
• Northwest Region: 62%
• Anchorage Region: 58%
• Other Interior Region: 56.5%
• Fairbanks North Star Borough: 49%
• Kenai Peninsula Region: 47.3%
• Matanuska-Susitna Region: 39.3%

CASES – DHSS today announced five deaths of Alaska residents, one death of a nonresident, and 841 new people identified with COVID-19 in Alaska since yesterday.  

808 were residents of: Anchorage (331), Fairbanks (105), Wasilla (82), Utqiaġvik (36), North Pole (32), Palmer (30), Eagle River (16), Yukon-Koyukuk Census Area (16), Ketchikan (15), Homer (13), Juneau (13), Seward (11), Dillingham Census Area (8), Kenai (7), North Slope Borough (7), Chugiak (6), Houston (6), Valdez (6), Anchor Point (5), Kotzebue (5), Soldotna (5), Kenai Peninsula Borough - North (4), Ketchikan Gateway Borough (4), Nome (4), Bethel (3), Bethel Census Area (3), Fairbanks North Star Borough (3), Big Lake (2), Kenai Peninsula Borough - South (2), Nome Census Area (2), Northwest Arctic Borough (2), Prince Of Wales-Hyder Census Area (2), Willow (2), Wrangell (2), and one each in Bristol Bay/Lake and Peninsula Borough, Delta Junction, Dillingham, Douglas, Healy, Hooper Bay, Kodiak, Mat-Su Borough, Metlakatla, Sitka, Skagway, Southeast Fairbanks Census Area, Tok, Unalaska, and Yakutat plus Hoonah-Angoon plus three locations under investigation.

33 new nonresident cases were identified in:

• Anchorage: 1 with purpose 'visitor', 7 with purposes under investigation
• Fairbanks: 6 with purposes under investigation
• Denali Borough: 3 with purposes tourism, 2 with purposes under investigation
• Juneau: 2 with purposes under investigation
• Seward: 1 with purpose 'other', 1 with purpose under investigation
• Sitka: 2 with purposes under investigation
• Bethel: 1 with purpose under investigation
• Ketchikan: 1 with purpose under investigation
• North Slope Borough: 1 with purpose North Slope oil
• Palmer: 1 with purpose under investigation
• Prince of Wales-Hyder Census Area: 1 with purpose under investigation
• Skagway: 1 with purpose under investigation
• Wasilla: 1 with purposes under investigation
• Location under investigation: 1 with purpose under investigation

One nonresident case was added to the cases dashboard due to data verification procedures bringing the total number of Alaska resident cases to 89,466 and the total number of nonresident cases to 4,166.

HOSPITALIZATIONS & DEATHS – There have been a total of 2,083 resident hospitalizations and 442 deaths. There were 24 new resident hospitalizations and five new Alaska resident and one nonresident deaths reported.

The five Alaska resident deaths were recent:

• A male Eagle River resident in his 60s
• A male Anchorage resident in his 70s
• A female Anchorage resident in her 70s
• A female Anchorage resident in her 70s
• A female Kenai resident in her 70s

The nonresident death was also recent:

• A male nonresident in his 70s

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

There are currently 197 patients diagnosed with COVID-19 who are hospitalized and 10 additional patients who are considered persons under investigation (PUI) for a total of 207 current COVID-related hospitalizations. Twenty-six of these patients are on ventilators. The percentage of patients currently hospitalized with COVID-19 is 18%.

TESTING – A total of 2,814,979 tests have been conducted, with 40,062 tests conducted in the previous seven days. The average percentage of daily positive tests for the previous seven days is 8.17%.

Variants of concern situation summary

Delta (B.1.617.2-like) – 242 added since last report

• To date, we have detected 1,438 cases in multiple locations across the state. Accounts for almost all newly detected cases. During the week of Aug. 15, delta represented 99% of sequenced cases in Alaska.

As of September 8, the total number of alpha (B.1.1.7) cases is 452; gamma (P.1) cases is 74; and delta (B.1.617.2-like) cases is 1,438.  The weekly genomic surveillance report is online at:  http://dhss.alaska.gov/dph/Epi/id/siteassets/pages/humancov/AKSeqCon_GenomicSituationReport.pdf

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 565.4. 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.