Visitation suspended at Anchorage Correctional Complex due to COVID-19 cases
Sep. 11—Corrections officials have suspended visitation at the Anchorage Correctional Complex, where 35 inmates have tested positive for COVID-19 recently.
Twenty-one cases involve members of the general population who were exposed to the virus while in custody, said Betsy Holley, a spokeswoman for the Alaska Department of Corrections, on Friday. Another 14 cases were confirmed among people who contracted the virus before entering the facility and were tested upon arrival, according to Holley.
About 36% of inmates at the Anchorage Correctional Complex were vaccinated as of Sept. 5, according to public data. That number fluctuates with facility's transient population.
Public visitation is also suspended at Ketchikan Correctional Center, Lemon Creek Correctional Center in Juneau and the maximum-security Spring Creek Correctional Center in Seward.
While attorney-client meetings are still allowed, the corrections department has cut back on movement and services amid contact tracing and testing, Holley wrote in an email.
The state's largest reported COVID-19 outbreak in a correctional facility occurred last year, when hundreds of inmates at Goose Creek Correctional Center tested positive in December.
