Alaska is now 3rd in the country for the highest case rate, with the state reporting nearly 900 cases and 1 death on Friday

Alaska ended a week of record COVID-19 cases and high hospitalizations with another high number of 893 new COVID-19 infections and one new death reported on Friday.

Alaska’s push – currently one of the worst in the country – is due to the highly contagious delta variant, which has increased the number of cases, hospitalizations and deaths in most of the United States in recent months.

But while other states have very recently started to see the number of cases level off, Alaska continues to report a high number of pandemics that the state epidemiologist says is showing little sign of slowing down this week.

Alaska was third in the country for new daily case rates and in the top five for new hospitalizations in the past two weeks on Friday, according to a tracker compiled by the New York Times.

A total of 204 COVID-positive patients were in state hospitals as of Friday, according to state data. That’s a slight drop from the start of the week, but it’s still a near record, and far higher than the number of hospitalizations reported during last winter’s peak. More than half of current hospitalizations were concentrated in Anchorage and included 33 people on ventilators.

Patients with the virus made up nearly half of the patients in the state’s intensive care units. In total, about one in five hospitalized Alaskans has COVID-19.

Hospitals say the number of virus hospitalizations is likely an underestimate of the true impact of COVID-19, as they do not include some long-term COVID-19 patients who are no longer positive but still need hospital care.

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Few states have exceeded their winter peaks like Alaska has in recent weeks. Of those who did, fewer overwhelmed their hospitals to the crisis level Alaska is currently experiencing. Providence Alaska Medical Center, the state’s largest hospital, this week began rationing care under crisis care protocols, while most other facilities have reported similar stress levels.

Alaskan Chief Medical Officer Dr Anne Zink this week urged Alaskans with less severe or longer-term health conditions to consider visiting emergency or walk-in clinics at instead of overwhelmed emergency rooms.

Because COVID-19-related hospitalizations and deaths are a few weeks behind case increases, overworked Alaskan hospitals are unlikely to see relief anytime soon.

Of the 893 new cases reported on Friday, 875 involved residents and 18 non-residents. Although cases are high across most of the state, road network communities with lower vaccination rates – including Anchorage, Fairbanks, Mat-Su, and most of the Kenai Peninsula – appear to be the hardest hit.

A new death was reported on Friday. As of March 2020, 454 Alaskans and 15 out-of-state people who were in Alaska have died from COVID-19.

After leading US states in per capita vaccination earlier this year, Alaska ranked 32nd on Friday. As of Friday, 62.2% of eligible Alaskans had received at least one dose of the vaccine and 57% were fully immunized, state data showed.

Meanwhile, state officials say the consistently high number of new cases is causing backlogs in contact tracing and reporting.

The state’s average seven-day test positivity rate – the number of positive tests out of the total performed – was 9.58% on Friday, a near-record high since the start of the pandemic. Health officials say anything over 5% indicates a need for more testing.

This is a developing story. Check back for updates.