Health

At least three Alaskans have died from complications of influenza so far this season, amid a surge in cases happening earlier than last year, according to state epidemiologists.

Alaska has seen about 1,100 reported flu cases so far this season, the state Health Department reported.

This flu season is dominated by a new variant of the flu virus, but getting the existing flu vaccine is still the best way to prevent getting infected, said Joe McLaughlin, who heads the state Section of Epidemiology.

“Historically, even when there are new variants of influenza that are circulating, people who are vaccinated tend to still have some protection against flu cases,” McLaughlin said. “But more importantly, they still seem to be quite well-protected against hospitalization and death compared to those who have not been vaccinated.”

Symptoms of the flu include fever, cough, sore throat, headache, a runny or stuffy nose and tiredness.

Those most vulnerable to have severe cases or be hospitalized include anyone age 65 and older, kids under 2, those with underlying medical conditions, obese people, pregnant women, and Black, Latino and Alaska Native people, according to the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention.

Benjamin Westley, an infectious disease physician in Anchorage, said he and his colleagues are concerned about the high number of patients they’re seeing with severe cases of the flu.

“Most of us are saying that we’ve never in our careers seen so much, both volume of flu coming into the hospital rapidly, as well as how ill people are,” Westley said.

It can be hard to tell the flu apart from other respiratory illnesses, but people at higher risk for complications should consider getting treatment right away, Westley said. Doctors can prescribe Tamiflu, also called oseltamivir, which is a medication that can reduce the flu’s severity.

“If you have a risk factor for a bad outcome of flu, and you have an influenza-like illness, meaning you have symptoms consistent with flu, you do not need a test and shouldn’t even really get a test,” Westley said. “You should just get treated.”

People sick with the flu need to talk to a medical provider to get a prescription, but they don’t necessarily need a doctor’s visit, Westley said. It’s best to take Tamiflu within 48 hours of experiencing flu symptoms, but Westley said it can still be effective for those with risk factors after that.

Alaskans can also protect themselves by washing their hands, staying away from coughing people and staying away from crowds, he said.

And if you get the flu, according to the CDC, you should stay home until you’ve been fever free without medicine for at least 24 hours.

After Juneau residents helped raise more than $1 million this fall, a local boy with a rare genetic disease will be able to receive a potentially life-changing gene therapy in the new year.

For the past two years, 4-year-old Cade Jobsisʼs mother Emma Jobsis has been raising money to allow scientists to restart clinical trials that previously showed promising results treating AP4 Hereditary Spastic Paraplegia, or SPG50. 

Cade was born with the rare disease, which would gradually take away his cognitive and motor function without treatment. 

“We got his diagnosis in 2023,” Jobsis said. “And that’s when we found this, this group that was working on this gene therapy, but there wasn’t any funding.”

Jobsis said she and three other families who have kids with the disease started asking their communities for help. She said the Juneau community has been supportive from the get go — especially the kids.

“They would knock on my door with a jar of coins, telling me they had collected them for him. And it was so heartwarming,” Jobsis said. “But it wasn’t the jar of coins that did it. It was the fact that so many kids and families were talking about him and telling people about him.”

The four families raised $3 million to pay for the production of the drugs. Then, in September, a grant that would have covered the treatment administration fell through. 

The families needed another $1.15 million.

Jobsis said she was a wreck, but she didnʼt lose hope. She used TikTok, Facebook and Instagram to spread the word. 

“I just got on my social media and just started talking. And boy oh, boy, did my community hear me,” she said.

Jobsis said so many businesses in Juneau stepped up to help raise the money she couldnʼt keep track of them all. In total, the Juneau community contributed more than $400,000 in just two months. 

They were still less than halfway to their goal. 

“And a local family contacted me,” Jobsis said. “And she said, ‘I have been watching your social media. I have seen what you’re trying to do, and I have heard you say on countless occasions that you just need to reach the right person, and we want to be that right person for you.ʼ”

That $600,000 donation brought them across the finish line, providing enough funding to treat all four kids.

One of them, a young girl named Naomi, got her first dose of the drug on Dec. 9. Now, the other three children are waiting to be scheduled. Jobsis said they’ll find out when Cade gets his treatment in the coming weeks.

“I cannot thank this community enough,” she said. “I mean, as the weather is terrible here, but we live here for the people, the community is unmatched.”

Alaska was awarded more federal money than any state besides Texas for a federal rural health initiative, the Centers for Medicare & Medicaid Services announced on Monday.

The money will come from the Rural Health Transformation Fund, a $50 billion program set up as part of the One Big Beautiful Bill Act and intended to counteract the effects of its sweeping Medicaid cuts in rural areas.

Alaska’s congressional delegation and state officials lauded the federal investment, which will be upwards of $272 million in Alaska in 2026.

At a Wednesday news conference in Anchorage, Sen. Dan Sullivan, R-Alaska, said the $1.36 billion the state is slated to receive over the next five years is the biggest investment from the federal government to Alaska’s health care system in state history.

“This is a generational opportunity for our state,” he said.

Heidi Hedberg, commissioner of the state’s health department said a major goal is to rework the state’s “fragmented” health system.

She said the agency will release more information about its plan for the money in the coming days, but pointed to the state’s application to the program, which outlines six priorities: maternal and child health, access to services, preventative care, a strengthened workforce, financial sustainability and updated technology and data systems.

Emily Ricci, the agency’s deputy commissioner, said that core to the state’s application was the question of how to support services that already exist in the state.

“Part of our focus was making sure that the tribal communities could see some of the ways that they want to sustain their programs and evolve or build their programs out further into something that provides more access and sustainable costs,” she said. “So I would say that those opportunities are written in each one of the initiatives.”

She did not immediately supply specific examples.

The state’s application also commits to adherence to several policies favored by the Trump administration, including a pledge to join licensure compacts and prohibit the use of federal Supplemental Nutrition Assistance Program funds to buy soda pop by 2027.

Several of those commitments require the approval of the state’s legislature or medical board.

Hedberg said her agency will work with those decision makers to follow through on the commitments the state made in its application.

In a virtual meeting with reporters after the state’s news conference, Sen. Lisa Murkowski, R-Alaska, challenged the state administration and legislators to take on the question of rebuilding the state’s health care system as a major issue.

In response to a reporter’s question, she said she was worried about the reliability of the funding because the state could fail to make the most of the opportunity or because the federal government could pause or cancel the funding.

“I know that we’re going into an election year next year. I know that the Permanent Fund always takes up space. I know we’re going to be talking about the gas line,” she said. “But we must, we must absolutely be talking about this health care opportunity that we have in front of us now.”

About one in 500 Alaskans died of COVID-19 between 2020 and 2023. That’s according to an epidemiology bulletin the Alaska Department of Health released Dec. 9, which says there were substantial racial disparities in rates of COVID-19 hospitalization and mortality in the state.

Early in the pandemic, for instance, age-adjusted mortality rates in the state were about 3.6 times higher for Asian and Pacific Islander people compared to white people, according to the bulletin. The disparity during that period – from June 2020 to January 2021 – was greatest among American Indian and Alaska Native people, whose age-adjusted mortality rate was 5.5 times higher than that of white people.

“It matters because … at the end of the day, what we would like to get to is that there are no disparities based on race for the various disease processes and vulnerabilities that people may have,” said Jacoline Bergstrom, the executive director of health services for Tanana Chiefs Conference (TCC), a nonprofit tribal organization based in Fairbanks that aims to advance the health and social service needs of its 42 members, 37 of which are federally-recognized tribes.

Bergstrom read the state bulletin and said the results didn’t come as a surprise, since officials were tracking data during the pandemic. Other studies have also observed similar disparities nationally. But she said the report’s comprehensive look back at COVID-19 in Alaska makes it a useful resource.

“Because when we were in it, we were in it, right? And we were tracking real-time,” Bergstrom said.

The 33-page document splits the pandemic into seven distinct eras and reviews multiple topics, including the disparities, but also the spread of the virus, the state’s response, the efficacy of vaccines and gaps in pandemic preparedness.

The magnitude of the racial disparities for hospitalization and mortality rates in Alaska fluctuated in the different phases of COVID-19 analyzed in the bulletin. But it says that the disproportionate impacts “continued for the entirety of the pandemic in Alaska,” and concluded by saying more research is needed to grasp the underlying social and structural issues.

Bergstrom also said the causes behind the disparities are numerous and complex, but she said limited access to running water in some parts of Alaska is one example. That’s because it impacts people’s ability to take preventative measures, like hand-washing, she said.

According to the Alaska Division of Water, more than 3,300 homes in Alaska don’t have modern plumbing, and a study during the pandemic linked limited water resources with increased risk for COVID-19 in Alaska villages. Bergstrom said the new report offers more evidence that improving those resources would be a boon to public health.

“Just seeing this data … it’s another really important factor where we can show – and say, ‘Hey, we need to get water and sanitation to our rural communities,’ because we know, we’ve seen some of the impacts during the COVID-19 pandemic,” she said.

Through Megan Darrow, a state department of health spokesperson, the state section of epidemiology declined an interview request about the bulletin, saying emailed questions would be routed to the appropriate “subject matter experts.”

In a written response to questions, health officials wrote that the disparities in Alaska COVID-19 amplified pre-existing inequities, and that contributing factors likely include housing conditions, limited access to timely or speciality healthcare, and higher prevalence of underlying medical conditions associated with severe COVID-19.

The response also said that “[r]educing disparities in a future pandemic will require both long-term structural investments and strengthened public health systems,” including culturally grounded outreach, expanded access to care, modernized disease surveillance systems, as well as a clinical a public health workforce “capable of sustaining prolonged, high-intensity responses.”

Three months after a trial against a former Juneau chiropractor accused of sexual assault ended in mistrial, the new public defense team is asking for more time to review the case before a second trial.

Fourteen former patients accused Jeffrey Fultz of sexual assault under the guise of medical care. They say the incidents took place during medical appointments between 2014 and 2020 while he was employed at Southeast Alaska Regional Health Consortium in Juneau.

In September, his trial ended in a hung jury on 14 counts of felony sexual assault, and two not guilty counts. One of the 14 counts has since also been dismissed. The state is attempting to retry the remaining charges that are eligible to be considered again.

The court assigned Fultz a public defender in October, Juneau’s Nico Ambrose. Private attorney James Christie represented Fultz for the last two years, and through the trial this summer. Ambrose appeared in court Wednesday for the first time since taking over Fultz’s representation.

Ambrose requested the next hearing date to be in April, which will mark five years since Fultz’s initial arrest. 

“There are just so many things in this case that need to be dealt with before we’re ready for trial,” he said. 

Ambrose said he has to review trial proceedings, which lasted six weeks this summer, and hasn’t yet received transcripts from the trial. Ambrose is Fultz’s third defense attorney since his 2021 arrest. 

Earlier this year, the Alaska Supreme Court issued a ruling that would limit delays in old cases, and while this case falls into that window, Ambrose said he doesn’t think it was written with a case like this in mind. 

“This case has not sat around for 5 years waiting to go to trial,” he said. “It has gone to trial.”

State Prosecutor Krystyn Tendy disagrees with scheduling the next hearing so far out and said the case has taken years, regardless of the recent trial. Some of the alleged crimes happened more than a decade ago. 

“We have seen how this case has dragged out and can drag out,” she said. 

Tendy said the court needs to set a new trial date, and should schedule a hearing in February. 

Ambrose said having hearings sooner than April — six months after he was assigned to the case — would be a waste of the court’s time.

Judge Larry Woolford scheduled the next hearing for this case on Feb. 11 at 11:30 a.m.

Winter in Alaska isn’t just cold. It can feel like the sun barely shows up. I wake up, and it’s dark. I go to work, still dark. By the time I drive home, it’s dark again. Every winter, those long, dark days can drag me into the winter blues — grumpy mornings, sadness and low energy.

This year, I wondered: How could I feel better during Alaska’s long, dark season without a huge effort or blowing my budget?

For this Alaska Survival Kit, I talked to two experts who shared five simple strategies.

1. Turn your bedroom into a cave

Debby Maloney, a nurse practitioner at Vitae Integrative Medical Center in Anchorage, said she sees many of the same patients each year as winter begins, seeking help for symptoms of seasonal depression. She said prevention is key because it’s easy for some people to descend into the winter blues by letting small things slide.

“We stay in bed longer,” she said. “We don’t take care of ourselves as well. We’re not exercising as much. We’re not eating the same foods and we start getting into this very slow decline, into this depressive state.”

So how do we avoid this fate?

It starts with where you sleep, Maloney said. She said you want to transform your bedroom into a cool, dark cave.

“Our bodies actually sleep better if we’re in a more cool environment,” Maloney said. “So cool, dark, cozy.”

She recommends turning your thermostat down by as much as 10 degrees at night.

2. Wake up with bright lights

To turn off the sleep hormone melatonin, you need light — and lots of it. With no morning sun in the winter, Maloney said your best bet is to use sun lamps, which mimic daytime brightness.

Maloney said she doesn’t have seasonal affective disorder, but she still uses the lamps to help with her energy and mood.

“Getting that bright light in your eyes within the first hour of waking up, [for] 20 to 30 minutes, it’s been a game changer for me,” Maloney said. “I don’t have that afternoon crash.”

If you’re on a budget, thrift stores or secondhand marketplaces usually have some of the lights for sale. Also, the hardware store sells more affordable light bulbs that simulate sunlight.

3. Don’t skip exercise

Maloney said even gentle exercise tells your body it’s time to wake up and you don’t need to be a super athlete to benefit.

“I used to tell some of my elderly patients that, if we can’t go outside and walk, maybe go to your favorite store and just walk around the perimeter,” she said. “Just get some exercise.”

4. Check in and reach out

Rani Malone, who works in mental health support at Alaska Behavioral Health, didn’t do anything special during seasonal changes as a kid growing up in Palmer. But as an adult, she’s leaned into self care in the winter to boost her mood.

One of her favorite tips is simple: Check in with neighbors and friends. It’s good for you and good for them.

“Asking people how they’re doing and trying to just connect and and plan things — social connection is going to be a huge thing that’s going to help you get through the season,” Malone said. 

5. Visualize the good. Repeat.

But it’s one thing to know that we should be doing these things, and another to make yourself do them in the winter, even if you don’t feel like it. Malone said to motivate yourself, visualize the good that will come out of it.

“Thinking of, what’s your overall goal?” she said. “So just, doing the opposite of what you naturally want to do, which is stay in bed and stay warm.”

She said the more you do a healthy routine, the easier it gets. And she would know. Her elaborate night routine includes winding down with aromatherapy and a shower with eucalyptus, dim lights, journaling and sipping a nightcap magnesium drink.

But she said self care like that isn’t always enough. Malone said to get professional help if you notice these signs:

“If you’re having a hard time getting out of bed multiple mornings, and it’s now turned into weeks, and you’re missing work, or you’re missing your responsibilities of taking care of your kids or your household,” she said.

And she said it’s really important to reach out for help if you’re thinking of harming yourself or others.

This story is part of Alaska Public Media’s Alaska Survival Kit series.