Alabama finds itself at 594 deaths per million making it 30th in the country when it comes to COVID-related deaths, according to the COVID Tracking Project.
The project found that when it comes to COVID-19 data, state authorities often have been looking at decontextualized data, which is causing hysteria like children staying out of school and businesses shutting down.
Alabama’s deaths and hospitalizations have not followed the same path as case increases and, instead, the state’s daily deaths peaked at 5 people per million.
“Cumulative deaths/million are less than half that of MA, and 1/3 that of NY. Note also how far recorded cases outstrip hospitalizations, and especially deaths during the summer peak,” the commentary states. “Note also that, despite having 2x Massachusetts' hospitalizations and observed cases on 10/22/20, Alabama has roughly the same number of people dying (per capita) over the last several weeks.”
Since Sept. 15, there has been a significant increase in testing for COVID-19 at 55 percent, which has also led to an increase in positive cases, leading many to assume the country is heading into a third wave of infections and deaths.
Emily Burns with The Pragmatist writes that it’s important to put the new numbers into context so that people will make wise decisions regarding what to do about the pandemic. She writes that in May, cases were tracked at nearly the same as hospitalizations. She notes that deaths and hospitalizations are more reliable data when tracking than cases are.
With COVID-19 testing up 70 percent since the second wave, Burns points out that the surge in testing is responsible for the increased number of new cases seen across the nation, not an increased infection rate many have been led to believe.
Alerts Sign-up