DHSS: Incidents of Staff-Staff Transmission in Alaska Schools

In a summary that predicts dark days ahead for the state of Alaska, DHSS has included a section on schools this week. According to the report:

• "In 50 of the 54 school districts where updated data was available, 789 confirmed cases of COVID-19 have been reported since August. 350 were in students, 251 in staff and 188 unspecified."
• "This reflects a disproportionate number of cases occurring in staff compared to students."
• "There are known incidences of staff-staff transmission at school and through social gatherings outside of school. Staff-student or student-staff transmission at school not occurring between household members have not been clearly identified. There have been several incidents of student-student transmission reported."
• "Transmission of COVID-19 in schools or school activities has been confirmed or is strongly suspected in at least 14 occurrences across various districts. This is likely an underestimate as transmission in schools is difficult to ascertain when case rates are high and many people have had multiple potential exposures."
• "Staff, students and parents are encouraged to get tested at the first sign of any symptoms and report any positive tests to a staff member or student to the school so that the school can notify close contacts and make other safety determinations."

The weekly report also goes on to indicate "that the largest increase in cases was again in the Anchorage Municipality, which averaged over 300 new cases a day this week, for a 14-day case rate per 100,000 people of 92 up from 72 last week," and that, "An updated model epidemic curve predicts Alaska’s cases will continue to accelerate over the next week and are expected to double again within the next 39 days or sooner, with a daily growth rate near 2%. This curve reflects data up through November 7 but excludes some of the large increases in the last week as data is sometimes delayed in reporting; the true current daily growth rate may be higher than 2%."

Also of particular interest in the summary is this line which reads, "Positivity rates for arriving travelers getting tested at Alaska airports have nearly doubled over the last two weeks, illustrating an increased risk of travel."

The weekly summary lacking in any kind of good news can be found here.