Anchorage’s COVID-19 cases have dramatically increased with the new omicron variant, but that doesn’t automatically mean the city will have a new masking mandate.
Anchorage recorded 446 cases the week of Christmas. The total jumped more than four times the following week, with 2,087 cases recorded the week of New Year’s.
Midtown Anchorage Assembly member Felix Rivera said the prior emergency mask mandate, enacted in October, was in response to COVID-19 infections overwhelming hospitals. Anchorage currently isn’t seeing a large spike in coronavirus-related hospitalizations. Statewide, there were 55 COVID patients in Alaska hospitals on Monday.
Rivera, who strongly supported the last mask mandate, said while he’s heard from constituents who want to require masks in the city again, there’s a lot about the omicron variant that’s unknown.
“Now we’re looking at new circumstances: What do case counts look like? What do hospitalizations look like? Is our system threatened — in threat of getting overwhelmed?” Rivera said. “And those are all really good questions that I don’t think we have the answers to quite yet.”
As far as getting some answers, Rivera said Assembly members are set to hear from city health department officials Wednesday morning during a Health Policy Committee meeting to discuss testing and the impact of the omicron variant on Anchorage.
The city of Juneau brought back its mask mandate this week in response to a spike in cases.
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Wesley Early covers Anchorage life and city politics for Alaska Public Media. Reach him at wearly@alaskapublic.org and follow him on X at @wesley_early. Read more about Wesley here.
