Alaska COVID Updates Missing Amid National COVID Surge

 Up among the tabs under the orange banner on top is a link to Respiratory Virus Cases.  That goes to a 'page' in Blogger's lingo, that is separate from the main posts I do here.  

Today I posted a new update there and I'm posting it here as well because it's important for Alaskans to know that State simply isn't updating the numbers in a timely manner, even though there is a national COVID surge.  A friend cancelled dinner plans last week because he got sick the night before and tested positive for COVID

I've been posting these updates there as they come out from the State.  That used to be weekly, but now it seems to be whenever they get around to it.  That Page (Tab) also has the charts the State publishes (used to publish?). Before that I tracked the COVID numbers they posted since March 2020.  Those are on other tabs up there under the banner.  

Here's today's update to my Respiratory Virus Cases update:

August 5, 2024 -  The last time I posted was July 12, a bit over three weeks ago.  The last date the state posted numbers for was July 6 - just under a month ago.  Meanwhile a lot of people are getting COVID, but in Alaska we aren't finding out because the State has cut back on how often they update the numbers.  To clarify, the post weekly updates, but they don't post them weekly.  They post two or three weeks at a time.  

As of today, there are four unreported weeks.  

Meanwhile, from the LA Times (I think this link isn't pay walled):

"COVID surge’s tenacity surprises experts

Doctors, others say infections have been strong this summer, with KP.3.1.1 subvariant the most common.

BY RONG-GONG LIN II

California’s summer COVID surge has proved to be particularly strong and enduring, surprising experts with its tenacity as it storms into a third month.

The strength of this summer’s COVID surge probably is largely related to the ever-more infectious subvariants that continue to emerge as the coronavirus evolves, said Dr. Elizabeth Hudson, regional chief of infectious disease at Kaiser Permanente Southern California.

A dizzying number of related subvariants — collectively dubbed FLiRT — have emerged in recent months. One in particular, KP.3.1.1, has been picking up steam at a startling pace and has become the most common strain nationwide."

New Respiratory Virus Dashboard Is Up [Alaska Is Flu Hotspot - UPDATED]

 Last week I reported here that Alaska is retiring the COVID dashboards.  

Today I found the new state Respiratory Virus site and updated my COVID Page report.  You can see that here.

Meanwhile here's what the screens look like that report Statewide and Regional cases of COVID, flu, and RSV.  On the site, these charts are interactive giving you specific numbers for COVID, flu, and RSV.  

I'm not sure that I'm going to continue reporting this data.  It seems the worst dangers of COVID are behind us.  At least until a more lethal version comes on the scene.  

[UPDATED October 20, 2023:  This CDC chart puts the Alaska chart into perspective.  We're the national hotspot right now.

Alaska Retires the COVID-19 Dashboard. Will Post Weekly Bulletins On Infectious Diseases, Invludimg COVID

 

This announcement is on the September Alaska COVID-19 Dashboard.

I checked the Alaska COVID-19 Dashboard today, and learned it is now an archive:

"The COVID-19 Cases Dashboard was updated for the last time on September 12, 2023.

Starting in Oct. 2023, we will be publishing a weekly bulletin on respiratory disease case 

trends, including COVID-19."

The upside is that we now will get weekly updates (they've been monthly for a while now.)

If there is a link to the new tracking system on the page, I can't find it. Another page says it will begin in October.

At What Point Is A Politician Liable For Deaths Because Of His Actions Or Inactions?

Retired pilot Dave Bronson took office as Anchorage's new mayor on Thursday, July 1.  That was at a time when Alaska's COVID situation was relatively low.  So low that the State Health and Human Services Department only posted new numbers Mondays, Wednesdays, and Fridays.  So my starting date on this chart is Friday, July 2, 2021.  My ending date is Thursday, September 23.  Yes, they went back to reporting the numbers five days a week.  There was a Friday report too.  One of the worst ever.  They added 41 deaths and the new resident case total was 1729.  The highest ever.  But that report included a lot of backlogged numbers.  Most of the deaths probably happened during Bronson's tenure, but the new cases inflated that one day total. I decided the Thursday report was damning enough.  

These numbers are for the whole state of Alaska, and the Mayor of Anchorage is only in charge of Anchorage, But Anchorage is by far the largest city in the state with almost half the population, and people from nearby the Matsu borough and the Kenai Peninsula work and shop in Anchorage.  Plus it's the transportation hub of the state.  Many people outside of Anchorage have to fly through Anchorage on the way to other places.  It's also the medical center of Alaska, the place where people from more rural areas, with smaller hospitals or just clinics, come for more serious health needs.  So what the Mayor of Anchorage does regarding COVID affects more than just Anchorage.   

Our mayor came into office  having at various times denied COVID was a serious problem.  He thinks people's individual liberties are violated by mask mandates and vaccine mandates. And that the health restrictions harm business more than the virus.  He recently said he didn't know what more he could do.  

The alarming change in the COVID numbers is the result of his willful ignorance.  His stubborn clinging to bullshit information.  (Sorry, misinformation is much too tepid a term for the organized and profitable propaganda that is aimed at Trump supporters.)

My sense is that Bronson is the kind of man who rarely if ever acknowledges he's wrong.  Maybe on something minor like flipping a coin.  But he's been adamantly certain about LGBTQ issues for many years.  It's hard for a man like him to do the right thing after investing so much of himself to following the wrong path.  And because he's mayor, his actions and or lack of actions, impact tens of thousands of people. 

 One hundred and forty-four people have died since he took over Anchorage.  

• Let's drop half of them as not Anchorage related.  
• Let's skip the first month in office (there were only 12 deaths reported between July 2 and August 2). That leaves us 132 deaths. 
• Let's cut out 50% of deaths since August 2,  since Anchorage only has half of Alaska's population.  That leaves us 66 deaths.  
• Let's just arbitrarily say that 10% (and this is really low) of those could have been avoided had Bronson taken rigorous action against the spread of COVID in Anchorage.  

That would be six people who would probably be alive, but for  Bronson's inaction.  Probably a lot more.  He may be passionate about the life of every single fertilized human egg that is created, but actual birthed human beings seem much less important to him.   And we're not even talking about all the people who have been very ill.  Or the businesses that are suffering because people are cautious about going out in public because the of huge surge in COVID cases.  

COVID Crisis In Anchorage Hospitals

 As some of you know, in addition to my regular posting here, I also do daily updates of Alaska COVID stats in a tab above which also has a chart of those number going back to March 15, 2020.  Those reports were filling up this regular blog post space, so I pushed them into the tab.  But every now and then I spill over from just reviewing the new numbers to adding additional context.  That happened today as we hit a new pandemic  high for new resident cases and for Test Positivity. And the number of COVID patients in our hospitals is only slightly below Monday's all time high.  So I'm copying today's Alaska COVID update here.

Wednesday, September 15, 2021 - We need a new way of classifying insane.  Doctors from Providence Medical Center testified at the Assembly that we are in a health crisis and that 30% of their patients are COVID positive and require much more intensive care, and people jeered them and Assembly Member Allard questioning the veracity of their testimony.

From Hrrrl Scouts Twitter coverage of Assembly

They Mayor of Anchorage is quoted in the Anchorage Daily News today as having said last week that "hospital capacity issues weren't caused byCOVID-19 patients but nurses leaving their jobs over vaccination requirements."  I'm going to believe the doctor's knowledge about the hospital crisis over the Mayor's undocumented claims.

Meanwhile we have two more deaths reported today (nine reported in the last three days.)  18 more hospitalizations.  201(34) COVID patients in the hospital- one less overall from yesterday, but one more on vents.  Is it an improvement when we gain a hospital bed because two people died?  

1064/1068 new resident cases.  That's another  2021 record.  It's a pandemic record period for one day.  (If you scroll through the chart above you'll see some higher numbers in that column - but those are for more than one day (usually Mondays when three days are reported.)  27 new non-resident cases. 

Over 11,700 tests, a fairly high one day number, yet the Test Positivity went up from 9.1 to 9.62.  A couple of notes here.  1)  Test Positivity is on a rolling seven day average.  So, even though yesterday it reported 9.1, today it reports (for 9/13/21) 9.57. Adding today's high number and dropping off the number eight days ago, raises all the numbers.  and 2) Test Positivity is the percent of people tested who test positive.  So if the Test Positivity is high, it means you should test more.  I said 'yet' above because 11,000 tests is higher then normal for one day, but the number still went up.  We should be testing more.  But the staffing to do all the contact tracing is probably not available for this level of infection.  

I'm not including the chart.  You can see that at the Alaska Daily COVID-19 Count 3 - May 2021 - ???  above.  

There Are No Available ICU Beds in Anchorage According To State Hospitalization Dashboard

Here's the link to the State Hospitalization Dashboard.  [I have to move from Safari to Chrome to get to the Dashboard.  Also the link goes automatically to Statewide.  On top in the middle is a drop to to select a region.  That's where you can see Anchorage.  And remember, the dashboards change daily.

"Friday, August 13, 2021 - Slightly better than yesterday.  No new deaths 20 new hospitalizations.  Ten fewer hospitalized COVID patients, but one more Vent- 116(9).    Available ICU beds up two to 26 statewide.  BUT there are none available in Anchorage.

For Anchorage 8/13/21

I think this is the first time we've been here.  So don't have a heart attack, serious stroke, car crash, or any other event that would require an ICU bed in Anchorage today and probably over the weekend.  

313/313 new resident cases. (I always like it when my calculations match the State's number, but if they don't match I don't worry about it.  My number always = today's #-yesterday's #.  There were 25 new non-resident cases.

About 5700 test.  Test Positivity down ever so slightly from 7.1 to 7.01.  

Be firm, but patient with the anti-maskers.  They've attached some sort of emotional and/or ideological symbolism to the masks.  And once they've joined that club, there's a lot of peer pressure not to defect.  They even are willing to risk their children's lives to stay members of the club.  

Thursday, August 12, 2021 - Bad numbers today.  Three new deaths.  22 new hospitalizations.  (This makes more sense than yesterday's 4 - I guess they're catching up.)  Hospitalizations are 123 (8) - the eight are on Vents and listed as 'COVID -positive and suspected.'  That's a combined increase from yesterday of four (not 22).  We're down to 24 available ICU beds in Alaska. 

376/378 new resident cases.  We have to go back to January 8, 2021 to get a higher number (403/403).  (There are some higher numbers since then, but they represent two or more days.)  New non-resident cases = 29.  

There were about 9900 tests and our Test Positivity is down slightly to 7.1.  That means 7.1% of people tested were positive."

In addition to blogging regularly, I've also been tracking a half a dozen or so Alaska COVID numbers as they are posted.  The numbers were posted every day.  Then down to weekdays as things improved.  Then down to three days.  And now it's back to five days.  It should be back to seven days because the numbers are like those back in January 2021 and earlier.

These COVID posts don't appear here.  They are on a tab [Alaska Daily COVID Count 3] just under the WHAT DO I KNOW? banner on top.  There are three different COVID tabs because the pages were getting so long they were really slow.  But the chart with the numbers goes back to March 15, 2020.  So you can scroll through it to daily changes.  

The state's numbers and mine often are different.  Not that I'm making mine up.  For new cases and newly hospitalized COVID patients, the state offers a number.  They also include totals.  I subtract the previous total from today's total to get my number of new resident cases and new hospitalizations.  That number isn't always the same as the one the state offers.  

Alaska's COVID Numbers Are Going Back Up

In the Alaska Daily COVID-19 Count 3 tab below the banner up top, I've got a spreadsheet with Alaska COVID stats since March 15, 2020. It's 3 because numbers 1 and 2 got so long and bulky, I needed a new one.  I started it because the state just kept replacing yesterday's numbers with today's and it was hard to know if things were getting better or worse.  They've got fancy dashboards now with graphs, but they are only posted three times a week now.  This week only twice because there was a holiday Monday.  Along with updated numbers on the chart.  I post some comments to give the numbers a little more meaning.  

In the last few weeks, the numbers have changed.  They were going down.  Then they seemed to level off.  And now they are going back up.  This isn't over yet.  I've kept my COVID posts mainly in the COVID tab, but given that we are moving up again, it seemed useful to repeat yesterday's (Friday) comments here in the main section of the blog.  You have to go to the tab to see the chart.

Friday, July 9, 2021 - Our direction has definitely changed.  We're going back up.

Two new deaths reported today for a total of 370 Alaskans. Note, reported doesn't tell us when they happened.  We don't know if it was in the last two days or ta while ago and that stats are just catching up.

There were 14 new hospitalizations.  27 COVID patients are hospitalized in Alaska.  There are 48 ICU beds available in Alaska.  That's a reasonably high number for the time I've been following it.  But it could drop if hospitalizations spike. That number is also affected by non-COVID patients.

You know that most of the hospitalizations lately are of unvaccinated people.  Not only are these people risking themselves, they're giving the virus time to mutate into ever more contagious and severe versions.  AND they are endangering all those under 12 who haven't been approved yet for vaccination. And they're using up medical facilities and the patience and time or health care workers unnecessarily. Most of the kids will probably have slight or no symptoms, but a number of them will get sick enough to be hospitalized.  But the anti-vaxers really don't seem to care about anyone but themselves.  It's like a bunch of are in a big rowboat trying to get to shore, but part of the group insists on jumping up and down and rocking the boat.  

117 more people tested positive in the last two days.  Nearly 60 a day.  

But what concerns me most is that Test Positivity was reported at 2.43.  That's the highest number I have (there were days when the numbers weren't available) since April 30, 2021.  There were about   6600 tests since Wednesday.  

I'm Not Really Being Lazy Just Because I Don't Have A New Post Everyday

 Because, actually, I do.  And sometimes two.  

Since I started tracking Alaska's COVID-19 cases, other posts aren't showing up so often.  I started just doing COVID-19 posts here, like this post.  But they were taking too much room and I was repeating the same charts over and over.  So I switched to a "Page" - a tab in Blogger jargon.  So now, unless you click on the tab above (just under the orange blog banner) it looks like I haven't done a new post.  

But in addition to updating the table with the day's new numbers, I do a brief summary as well.  Like this one from yesterday:

Monday, October 19, 2020 - Good signs, but not all good.  

Today was the second day in a row with no new deaths or new hospitalizations.  October 4 was the last time we had just one day with no deaths or hospitalizations.  We have to go back to September 14 and 15 for two days in a row like that.  And before that?  June 27-30 when there were four days with no deaths or hospitalizations.  This might just be a problem of not getting the hospitalization reports in over the weekend.  But it's a glimmer of hope.

There were 208/200 new resident cases.  It's four days in a row with 200 or more cases.  That has never happened before in Alaska.  Not so good.  The more cases, the more eventual hospitalizations and deaths to follow.

27 reported recoveries and 175 MORE active cases - for another all time high of 5235.

11,012 new tests, one of the highest totals. [10/20/20 -Had typo in chart yesterday.  Not sure how many new tests, yesterday.  The updated past numbers are totally different from what I documented daily.] We're at [5]33,723 tests total.  Our state population is about 730,000.  But this number is NOT how many Alaskans have been tested, but how many tests have been given.  Many essential workers get tested over and over again. 

The test positivity rate dropped slightly from 4.78 yesterday to 4.6 today.  Under 5.0 is good.  

The State keeps other numbers I don't keep track of on the chart above.  I've been reporting Reproductive Number in the daily reports lately.  Today down slightly to 1.07.  Under 1 is the goal.  We're close.

I haven't mentioned hospital capacity for a while, mainly because it hasn't been an issue.  But when I looked today, The hospitals are getting a little more crowded.

57% of adult beds are occupied.  There are 550 vacant.  That's for everything, not just COVID-19.

68% of adult ICU beds are occupied.  There are only 43 left.  Again, not just COVID-19 patients.

Ventilators aren't an issue at this point.  Only 9% being used with 324 left.  

There are 41 COVID-19 patients in hospital beds and 24 more suspected COVID-19 cases.  

What I'm learning is that the State's numbers are fluid.  That is they get adjusted as more info comes in - maybe some new cases turn out to be non-residents instead of residents, or a bunch of tests come in from several days ago.  I'm just doing each day's numbers and if anyone every wants to know how much the State's numbers have fluctuated, they can compare what the State has posted to what I have posted.  Though that won't show how often the State adjusted their numbers.  

We've been seeing about 200 new resident cases a day this last week or so and the number of active cases keeps going up because new cases outpace recovered cases.  Though recovered cases are one of the least up-to-date numbers they offer.  

On the positive side, our Test Positivity has only been over 5.0 a couple of times.  (5.0 is the target number set by the WHO.  And our Reproductive Number is only fractions above the target number to be below: 1.0.  

But with not much effort at all, the numbers could explode, and our hospitals could get overpacked.  

Anyway, just wanted to point out that this action is taking place a little hidden from sight in the tabs. There are two COVID tabs because the first one was getting really big.  It goes from June 1 to September 30. (Before that I was doing daily COVID-19  posts, which you can probably find most easily by looking at the Blog Archive (right had column) in March, April, and May.  The new tab started October 1.  

Stay well and if you must engage the anti-maskers do it gently and just listen, don't argue.  Ask questions if you have to say anything.  They have issues regarding power mostly, so telling them to do something pisses them off.  Like a rebelling teenager who will do the opposite of what you ask them to do.  These are chronological adults, but emotional teenagers.  (Yeah, that's a pretty broad generalization, but I suspect it's more accurate than not.)

Alaska COVID Updates Now In Tab Above

I'll continue to track Alaska's COVID-19 cases in the tab up top.  Seven more today.  Terrible weekend in the United States, yet also a promising one as people take to the streets,  apparently believing that racism is a greater threat to them and the nation than the virus.  And as people on the right attack them and the violence that has touched the demonstrations, I'm reminded that peaceful demonstrations haven't changed things much.  That Colin Kaepernick's peaceful protest was attacked just as vigorously.  It's not the type of protest that folks object to, it's that people are pointing out the pervasiveness of racism in the US.  These are probably the same people who complain that Jews didn't fight back during the Holocaust.  Well, blacks and their allies are fight back now.  (By the way, Jews did fight back when they could.)   And the president is hiding in a 'bunker' at the White House.  Trump fears weakness more than anything, and yet he's displaying his own impotence as president of the United States.  He tends to accuse people of what he's doing himself - if you haven't noticed, pay attention.  Now he's accusing the Democratic governors of being weak.

Alaska COVID-19 Count Friday May 29, 2020 - 5 New Cases, 1 New Hospitalizations

Today's five new cases seems good, only in comparison to yesterday's 13 new cases.  Before yesterday, the last time we had over four cases was May 1.  After I posted yesterday, I thought that maybe the jump in the numbers resulted from a week of Kenai test results getting processed in on day (there were seven from Kenai yesterday.)  But today's numbers include two more from Kenai, as well as two from Anchorage, and one from Juneau.

CONFIRMED COVID-19 CASES ALASKA MARCH/APRIL/May 2020
Monday	Tuesday	Wednesday	Thursday	Friday	Saturday	Sunday
new/total	hos=hospital		12th  = 0/0	13th = 1/1	14th = 0/1	15th = 0/1
16th = 0/1	17th = 2/3	18th = 3/6	19th = 3/9	20th = 3/12	21st= 2/14	22nd= 8/22
23rd=14/36	24th =6/42 1 hos 1 dead	25th = 17/59 3 hos 1 dead	26th = 10/69 3 hos 1 dead	27th =16/89 5 hos 2 dead	28th = 13/102 6 hos 2 dead	29th= 12/114 7 hos  3 dead
30th=5/119 7 hos 3 dead	31st= 14/133 9 hos 3 dead
April 2020		1st=  10/143 9 hos 3 dead	2nd=8(6)/149 13 hos 3 dead	3rd=8(11)157 15 hos 3 dead	4th=15/171 16 hos 5 dead	5th= 14/185 20 hos 6 dead
6th=6/191 23 hosp 6 dead	7th= 22/213 23 hosp 6 Dead29 recovered	8th= 13/226 27 hosp 7 dead 32 recovered	9th= 9/235 27 hosp 7 dead 49 recovered	10th=11/246 28 hosp 7 dead 55 recovered	11th=11/257 31 hosp 8 dead 63 recovered	12th= 15/272 31 hosp 8 dead 66 recovered
13th= 5/277 32 Hosp 8 dead 85 Recovered	14th = 8/285 32 Hosp 9 dead 98 Recovered	15th= 8/293 34 Hosp 9 dead 106 Recovered	16th= 7/300 35 hosp 9 dead 110 recovered	17th=  9/309 36 hosp 9 dead 128 recovered	18th =  5/315 36 hos 9 dead 147 Recovered	19th= 4/319 36 hos 9 dead 153Recovered
20th 2/321 36 hos 9 dead 161 recovered	21st 8/329 36 hos 9 dead 168 recovered	22nd  6/335 36 hos  9 dead 196recovered	23nd  2/337 36 hos  9 dead 209recovered	24th  2/339 36 hos  9 dead 208recovered (-1 from 4/23)	25th  0/339 36 hos  9 dead 217recovered	26th  2/341 36 hos  9 dead 217recovered
27th  4/345 37 hos  9 dead 218recovered	28th  6/351 37 hos  9 dead 228 recovered	29th  4/355 36 hos  9 dead 240recovered	30th  0/355 36 hos  9 dead 252recovered
May 2020				1st  9/364 36 hos  9 dead 254recovered	2nd  1/365 36 hos  9 dead 261recovered	3rd  3/368 36 hos  9 dead 262recovered
4th  2/370 37 hos  9 dead 263recovered	5th  1/371 38 hos  9 dead 277 recovered	6th  1/372 38 hos 10 dead 284recovered	7th  2/374 38 hos 10 dead 291recovered	8th  3/377 38 hos 10 dead 305recovered	9th  1/378 38 hos 10 dead 318recovered	10th  1/379 38 hos 10 dead 324recovered
11th  1/381 38 hos 10 dead 328recovered	12th  2/383 38 hos 10 dead 334 recovered	13th  0/383 38 hos 10 dead 335recovered	14th  4/387 39 hos 10 dead 339recovered	15th  1/388 41 hos 10 dead 343recovered	16th  4/392 43 hos 10 dead 344recovered	17th  4/396 43 hos 10 dead 344recovered
18th  3/399 43 hos 10 dead 345recovered	19th  0/399 43 hos 10 dead 348 recovered	20th  3/402 44 hos 10 dead 352recovered	21st  0/402 44 hos 10 dead 356recovered	22st  2/404 44 hos 10 dead 356recovered	23rd4/408 45 hos 10 dead 358recovered	24th 0/408 45 hos 10 dead 358recovered
25th1/409 45 hos 10 dead 361recovered	26th 2/411 45 hos 10 dead 362 recovered	27th 2/411 46 hos 10 dead 362recovered	28th13/425 46 hos 10 dead 366recovered	29th5/430 47 hos 10 dead 367recovered

State Charts

The screen shot above is high resolution so you can click on it to enlarge and focus. Click here if you want to use the chart interactively,

Alaska Covid-19 Data NewFor... by Steve on Scribd

I'd also suggest a commentary in the ADN this morning by Dr. Stephen Tower and a lot of other folks, including State Senator Cathy Giessel, explaining why social distancing has kept our numbers low in Alaska, the state's right to impose restrictions during a health emergency, and that getting herd immunity through allowing the infection to just spread naturally would kill 15,000 Alaskans.