Can Alabama’s coronavirus numbers be trusted? Maybe. Sort of. Not exactly.

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Since Gov. Kay Ivey issued a statewide mask ordinance, Alabama's new coronavirus cases have trended down. That's good. However, the state's data is getting messier and less reliable. That's bad. (Mickey Welsh/The Montgomery Advertiser via AP)AP

This is an opinion column.

At first glance, it looks like Alabama’s coronavirus numbers might be getting better. 

Might be.  

Positive cases are, maybe, trending down. Hospitalizations seem to be leveling off.

Maybe

Those are good things, and let’s all hope they’re real.

Hope.  

However, we shouldn’t have to pray on this one. And I shouldn’t have to use a lot of fudge language like might and maybe. We should know — or at least have a better degree of certainty. But right now we don’t.

To see why, let’s look at the place where I grew up — Clarke County, Alabama.

Until the last week, Clarke County seemed to be doing OK. Like a lot of rural counties, its numbers were small. It hadn’t reported more than 17 new cases in a day, and its 7-day average had fallen to a little more than three. 

Then, on Aug. 8, it reported 166 new cases.  

On Aug. 9 — zero. 

On Aug. 10 — 164 new cases. 

That piddling 7-day average of 3 cases per day suddenly jumped to 48, which looks alarming until you understand why it’s meaningless. 

On Wednesday — five months into the pandemic — the Alabama Department of Public Health explained in a statement that there had been new private labs performing tests and not reporting their data to the state. 

“ADPH was not aware of some of these labs, and these labs were not familiar with mandatory reporting of notifiable diseases. When ADPH becomes aware of a new lab performing (COVID-19) testing, ADPH educates the labs regarding uploading data in a timely, accurate electronic format,” ADPH said on Twitter. “As these labs were not reporting to ADPH until they understood the requirement, their data contains older reports which increases case numbers.”

That sudden spike in Clarke County was backfill. Apparent surges in Mobile and Montgomery counties were phantoms, too. 

Maybe

What we see now might not be as bad as it looks, and what we saw before might not be as good as we thought. 

Might

While Alabama’s numbers seem to be getting better, the state’s data has been steadily getting worse. 

For sure. 

Beginning in mid-July, there have been irregularities in the numbers, and those anomalies seem to be getting more frequent. At the same time, my colleagues at AL.com have struggled to get explanations from health department officials. Responses have slowed as the numbers have become less reliable. 

Data available in other states just isn’t there on the state health department’s dashboard. We still don’t have a clear picture of what’s happening in nursing homes. Hospitalization data is erratic. The numbers jump up and down so herky-jerky that, if those lines were an EKG, the patient would be dead. 

Other data, like tests-by-county, recently disappeared. 

I shouldn’t have to say it, but somehow I always do: Do better, Alabama. 

Other states already are. 

Tennessee’s dashboard doesn’t just look better than Alabama’s site; its data is richer, too. Cases are broken down into smaller age groups. Racial breakdowns account for all but 1 percent, unlike Alabama’s 36 percent “unknown.” 

Let’s face it. When you don’t know what race a third or more of your cases are, how much contact tracing could you be doing? 

Meanwhile, Louisiana’s health department does have contact tracing data available on its website. Their state can show whether outbreaks are coming from bars, restaurants, workplaces or schools, etc. 

That sort of information is precious right now.

Alabama is driving through a storm without windshield wipers. For the moment, it seems the virus is cutting us a break, or better, masks are working. That much we can see through the rain. 

But there are some big clouds ahead. 

Like Labor Day. 

We saw big jumps after Memorial Day and the Fourth of July. There’s no reason to think the next big family picnic-fest is going to cut us a break. 

Like schools. 

Nobody knows what effect reopening schools will have, but no serious person believes it will make our numbers better. 

Like football. 

It’s not just stadiums and locker rooms, we’ll have to account for, but living rooms, homecomings and Iron Bowl parties, if the seasons make it that far. 

A storm is coming, and we’ve got to see bright yellow lines of the road through that windshield. 

There will be traffic lights. There will be stop signs. 

Hope won’t be enough. And might and maybe aren’t going to cut it. 

Kyle Whitmire is the state political columnist for the Alabama Media Group.

You can follow his work on his Facebook page, The War on Dumb. And on Twitter. And on Instagram.

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