Two counties on opposite ends of Alabama have seen swift declines in new coronavirus cases over the past week, helping fuel the state’s falling case numbers.
Baldwin County, on the coast, and Madison County, home of Huntsville in north Alabama, each saw their 7-day rolling averages for new coronavirus cases plummet this week, according to data from the Alabama Department of Public Health.
The state as a whole has seen a substantial cooling off in new cases.
The statewide average fell by nearly 200 daily cases week over week, and has been falling for longer than that. The rolling average peaked at over 1,850 daily cases on July 19. The 7-day average fell below 1,400 for the first time in nearly a month on Friday. It now stands at 1,364.
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Gov. Kay Ivey issued a statewide mask order on July 15, and the decline in new cases came shortly after. It’s impossible to say whether the mask ordinance is part of the reason for the decline in cases, but Dr. Karen Landers at ADPH thinks it’s possible.
“Our statewide mask order does appear to be having an impact,” she said on Friday. “Let’s take this small amount of improvement as good news and let’s continue to follow these measures in order to reduce the further spread of this disease in the state of Alabama.”
For Baldwin and Madison counties, this week’s numbers represent the continuation of a trend - both counties saw their averages peak at well over 100 daily cases at some point in July, and both have fallen rapidly since.
Madison’s peak so far came on July 15, which the 7-day average reached 183 cases per day. The average there has fallen by more than 100 daily cases since then. Baldwin County’s average peaked at more than 120 daily cases on July 23. It’s now less than half that.
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ADPH confirmed 9,549 new virus cases between Aug. 1 and Aug. 7, the lowest weekly total in nearly a month, and the first time in as long the state hasn’t added 10,000 cases in a week. This was the second consecutive week of declining cases, following a peak of 12,254 cases for the week ending July 24.
There was a moment earlier in the week when it looked like Alabama’s numbers were falling even faster - the state recorded fewer than 1,000 cases on Tuesday and Wednesday, the first time since early July that Alabama had seen two consecutive days with fewer than 1,000 cases.
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That midweek lull in case numbers, though, was accompanied by lower-than usual testing numbers. But at the end of the week, as cases ticked up, tests ticked up faster, resulting in Alabama’s lowest positivity rate since the middle of July. Over the last seven days, 16.2 percent of tests reported by ADPH have come back positive. That number rose past 20 percent earlier this month.
“At this point, I am somewhat encouraged that over the last couple of weeks, our percent positivity for tests statewide has declined,” Landers said. “That’s still very high and it’s still above the number we would like. We would like to get less than 10 percent and I think that can happen if we continue to be vigilant.”
But even as case numbers have cooled slightly, reported deaths due to the coronavirus have not. The state reported 143 new virus deaths in Alabama this week - slightly more than the 136 reported the week before, and the fourth consecutive week Alabama has reported more than 100 virus deaths in a week. Before that stretch, the state had only reported more than 100 deaths in a week once, in the week ending April 24.
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Deaths are typically a lagging indicator, and can trail new cases by several weeks. But because of they way they’re reported, there is also a significant lag between when someone dies and when their death is officially recorded as a coronavirus death. Because of that, it’s difficult to determine whether the current rise in reported deaths is related to the spike in cases the state experienced in July.
Which other counties are cooling off?
Forty-nine of Alabama’s 67 counties saw their 7-day averages for new cases fall from July 31 to Aug. 7. Outside of Baldwin and Madison, Calhoun County, home to Anniston, had the biggest decline in cases. The 7-day average there fell by more than 20 daily cases, down to 42. Those three were the only counties to see declines of more than 20 cases per day.
Houston, Tuscaloosa, Etowah, Shelby and Colbert counties all saw their 7-day averages fall by more than 10 cases per day. You can see their averages, along with those for every other county in the state, in the table below.
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Some other counties with smaller populations also saw substantial declines. Perry County, a Black Belt county with one of the state’s smallest populations, saw its 7-day average fall by more than 60 percent.
But not all counties saw declines.
Mobile County, just across the bay from Baldwin, has had a long, up and down battle with the virus. It saw its 7-day average jump by more than 40 cases this week - by far the biggest jump in the state. Mobile County is now averaging more than 200 new virus cases per day.
As of Friday, that was just less than Jefferson County, the most populous county in the state and home to Birmingham. Though Mobile spent much of the week leading the state in that statistic. Jefferson was averaging 221 new cases per day as of Friday, the most in the state.
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Jackson County, just east of Madison, had the third highest increase in 7-day average week over week behind Mobile and Jefferson. Its average increased by 10 daily cases, up to 28. Those three counties were the only ones to see increases of at least 10 daily cases to their averages.
Jefferson County added 1,549 total new cases this week, the most of any county in the state. Mobile was just behind, with 1,481 new cases this week. They were the only two counties with more than 1,000 total cases, and no other county was even close. Madison was third with just 530 cases this week.
Jefferson and Mobile counties also led the state in new reported virus deaths. Each reported 19 new deaths this week. Jefferson now has 242 reported virus deaths since the start of the pandemic, the most in the state. Mobile is second with 206. Montgomery’s 148 is third. No other county has more than 100.
AL.com reporter Paul Gattis contributed to this report.
Do you have an idea for a data story about Alabama? Email Ramsey Archibald at rarchibald@al.com, and follow him on Twitter @RamseyArchibald. Read more Alabama data stories here.