The Alaska Department of Health and Social Services announced the highest number of new COVID-19 cases in Alaska for a single day on Sunday – 231 newly diagnosed individuals. Of these, 186 are residents, including one in Homer, and 45 are nonresidents. Of the nonresident cases, 34 are in the seafood industry in Seward, one is in the visitor industry, and ten are unknown.
One new death was also announced in Fairbanks over the weekend, bringing Alaska’s COVID-19 fatality total to 20.
Sunday’s record high case count for Alaska’s residents can be attributed to a variety of factors, including widespread community transmission from social gatherings, several large seafood industry outbreaks, and a backlog of test results that were just entered into the database. Over half of these results are initially submitted via fax, and some are reported by phone, which requires manual verification and then data entry into the state’s data hub. Test results arrive in batches and are not always submitted daily, which can add to the backlog.
Three additional nonresident cases were added from previous dates. This brings the total number of Alaska resident cases to 2,524 and the total number of nonresident cases to 578. The average percentage of daily positive tests for the previous three days is 1.91%.
There have been a total of 115 hospitalizations. There are currently 35 patients diagnosed with COVID who are hospitalized and an additional eight patients who are considered persons under investigation for a total of 43 current COVID-related hospitalizations.
