August 2, 2021
Since my last Covid newsletter on July 29, Alabama’s 7-day moving average of daily cases has risen from 2,098 per day to 2,434 per day. After failing to report on July 30, ADPH reported 5,414 cases on July 31 (covering two days) and then 1,798 cases on August 1 and 1,705 more cases today. The statewide positivity rate is 23% for the last 7 days, the highest in the nation. A high positivity rate is the best indicator of rapid community spread.
And that is what we have. While new daily cases continue to climb, the hospitalization rate (a lagging indicator) just exploded. As of today, there are 1,883 confirmed patients in 103 statewide hospitals (or 18.3 patients per hospital), a level last seen at the end of January. Earlier this month, Huntsville Hospital Health System was treating 35 Covid patients. Just a few weeks later, that number more than tripled to 129 and now, there are 143 patients - with 46 in the ICU and 13 on a ventilator. According to Health & Human Services, an average of 72% of ICU beds were occupied in hospitals nationwide as of July 29. But, in Alabama, the average is 86%, while in Birmingham the average of 8 hospitals is 87%; and in Mobile, the average of 7 hospitals is 94%.
Over the last 14 days, Alabama has averaged 49 daily cases per 100K population, trailing just four other states in per capita infections. All four of the other states are located in the Deep South - Louisiana (89 per 100K); Florida (74 per 100K); Arkansas (62 per 100K); and Mississippi (50 per 100K). A closer examination, however, reveals an important and under-reported aspect of the recent surge in the Southeast - namely, the epicenter of this surge along the Gulf Coast.
Take Lower Alabama (L.A.), for instance. The Mobile metropolitan area has averaged about 108 new cases per 100K over the last 14 days, twice the state average. The Mobile area is getting infected at 2 ½ times the rate of the Birmingham area and 4 times the rate of the Huntsville and Montgomery areas over the same time period. Every single one of the 10 counties in Alabama with the highest daily infection rates are located along a corridor adjacent to the Florida Panhandle. During the three prior Covid surges in this State over the last 18 months, infections were more geographically diffuse, not concentrated in a single epicenter.
The Gulf Coast is also the epicenter of the Delta surge in the State of Florida. The worst Florida counties are in the Panhandle (and also Jacksonville) - specifically, the Panama City area (~ 135 daily cases per 100K). In the State of Mississippi, Stone County (near Gulfport) has an infection rate of 151 cases per 100K, almost 50% higher than the rate of any other county in Mississippi. And then, there is Louisiana - where every parish along the Gulf Coast has an infection rate between 100-135 daily cases per 100K. Of the 10 counties in the United States with the highest current infection rates, 6 of them are located in Louisiana along the coast.
My point is not that there is something intrinsically wrong with the Gulf Coast, with its pristine beaches that are the envy of the world. My point is simply that areas like Lower Alabama and the Florida Panhandle, which have extremely low vaccination rates and poor respect for masks, are sitting ducks for the Delta variant - just like the Lake of the Ozarks in the corner of SW Missouri, NW Arkansas and NE Oklahoma. When the Delta variant gets going, it spreads like wildfire - much faster than other strains of this virus.
Vaccinations in Alabama did increase by 30% week-over-week. That’s good but it may be too little too late. We are still averaging barely 11,000 vaccinations per week and only half our adult population has been vaccinated. If the experience of Lower Alabama, the Florida Panhandle and the Gulf Coast of Mississippi/Louisiana has taught us anything, it is to respect the ferocity of this variant. Get vaccinated and wear a mask. The totals:
7/19 - 2,343
7/20 - 1,391
7/21 - 1,632
7/22 - 1,567
7/23 - 1,733
7/24 - 1,888
7/25 - 1,536
7/26 - 1,403
7/27 - 2,667
7/28 - 2,726
7/29 - 2,730
7/31 - 5,414
8/1 - 1,798
8/2 - 1,705