Outbreak tied to Ketchikan wrestling tournament involves over 20 cases across 5 Southeast communities
Print article A COVID-19 outbreak associated with a high school regional wrestling tournament held in Ketchikan in late April has now been linked to more than 20 coronavirus cases in five Southeast communities, health officials said this week. The tournament, which attracted athletes from seven schools around Southeast Alaska, was hosted by Ketchikan High School. Officials from Region 5, which represents Alaska School Activities Association schools in the area, issued a warning to Ketchikan High School for allegedly failing to test wrestlers or enforce mask wearing at the event both of which are required under the region’s mitigation policies.
Ketchikan Community Risk Level Raised to HIGH; Ketchikan High School Closed Through Friday, May 7th
Tuesday PM
Ketchikan, Alaska - The Ketchikan Emergency Operations Center and Ketchikan School District have seen an increase in COVID-19 cases in the past couple of weeks, including an increase in community spread cases. There are 12 new cases reported in Ketchikan today, and 9 cases reported on Monday. Seven of those cases were determined to be close contacts to a known positive case, three were attributed to community spread, three were determined to be related to recent travel, and eight of the cases remain under investigation. In the past 10 days, there have been more than 10 positive cases attributed to staff or students of the Ketchikan High School.
KETCHIKAN (KDN) â The Ketchikan Emergency Operations Center recorded nine new positive COVID-19 test results during the three-day period from Saturday through Monday, and Ketchikan High School closed to in-person learning on Tuesday due to two positive cases at the school.
Seven of the cases were charted on Monday, and two were counted on Saturday, according to the EOC dashboard on Monday evening.
All but one of the seven cases recorded on Monday involved symptomatic individuals.
Three of the Monday cases were still under investigation as to source, two were related to recent travel, one was due to close contact with a known positive case and one was found to be community spread, the dashboard showed.
KETCHIKAN (KDN) â The Ketchikan Emergency Operations Center on Friday charted four new COVID-19 cases â all involving symptomatic individuals â while one individual was hospitalized in the COVID-19 unit at PeaceHealth Ketchikan Medical Center according to a Friday press release.
According to the EOC release, two of the Friday cases involved close contacts of a known positive case, and two were still under investigation.
Of Ketchikanâs 452 cumulative cases, 252 have been linked to close contact with a known positive.
As of Friday evening, 17 cases of COVID-19 were still active in Ketchikan.
The local positivity rate dropped from 2.17% on Thursday to 1.93% on Friday, the EOC dashboard showed.
KETCHIKAN (KDN) â The Ketchikan Emergency Operations Center recorded two new COVID-19 cases on Wednesday, one of which was found to be connected to a recent cluster of cases stemming from weekend events at Ketchikan High School, which prompted an extension of Kayhiâs in-person learning closure through the weekend.
âOne of the new cases remains under investigation and one of the cases is a close contact to a known positive case,â according to the joint media release from the EOC and the Ketchikan School District.
The release also stated that one of the cases was connected to Kayhi.
Kayhi was set to reopen for in-person learning on Thursday after being closed on Wednesday due to five cases linked to the school, but âthe complexity of the contact tracingâ for the cases led the building closure to be extended through Friday.