New state health department data reveals spread of COVID-19

The numbers released by the Department of Health Services on Sunday show the 85714 zip code with 64 confirmed cases. By Monday it was 67. That’s more than any other single zip code in the state. (Arizona Department of Health Services/Courtesy)

The numbers released by the Department of Health Services on Sunday show the 85714 zip code with 64 confirmed cases. By Monday it was 67. That’s more than any other single zip code in the state. (Arizona Department of Health Services/Courtesy)

PHOENIX — So it turns out that some areas of the state, like the near south side of Tucson, may not be quite the COVID-19 hotspots that newly released data would show.

The numbers released by the Department of Health Services on Sunday show the 85714 zip code with 64 confirmed cases. By Monday it was 67. That’s more than any other single zip code in the state. But here’s the thing.

State health officials report that if they don’t know the home address of the patient, they include it in the zip code of the medical provider, followed by the address of the facility that reported the case.

And what’s not clear is how many of the cases listed for 85714 -- the area between Ajo Way and Irvington Road -- are simply patients at Banner University Medical Center South. The fact that the 85714 data may include the hospital does not necessarily mean there isn’t a hotspot on Tucson’s south side.

The 85706 zip code just south, down to Drexel Way, reports 49 cases. But there are some indications the data are skewed. Consider: the 85714 zip code, according to most recent census data, has 15,138 residents. So the rate of infection would be about 4.5 per 1,000 persons. By contrast, the 49 cases in 85706, with 58,266 residents, comes out to 0.8 cases per 1,000 residents. And in the area to the west of both zip codes, the 32 cases in 85746 translates of 0.7 cases per thousand. In the Phoenix area, the 85008 zip code with Valleywise Medical Center -- the old Maricopa Medical Center -- shows 28 cases, versus from just 6-10 in the zip code just to the west. When population is figured in, that comes out to less than 0.5 cases per thousand.

And the rate is just a fraction of that in the 85006 zip code with Banner University Medical Center in Phoenix where fewer than 10 cases were reported, Questions about hospital data aside, there are other gaps in the data. Results for zip codes where Native Americans constitute a majority of the population were not released, though the health department provided no specific reason for suppressing the data other than they were waiting for tribal approval. But the statewide totals, including the fact that 15 percent of the 122 deaths as of Monday due to COVID-19 were of Native Americans, appears to incorporate those missing numbers.

Still, there are some data points that appear to support the disproportionate affect on Native Americans.

In the 86047 zip code, the area around Winslow, the 48 cases translates out to about 2.3 per thousand. And with 52 cases, the 86040 zip code in and around Page comes out at about 4.7 cases per thousand residents, a figure higher than even the zip code around Tucson’s Banner Hospital. That, however, may not be true statewide.

Most notably, there are no reports of COVID-19 cases from Fort Huachuca in Sierra Vista. State officials had no immediate answers for the gap -- and whether the 16 cases reported in Cochise County and 3,702 statewide include any military living on the base. Ditto Luke Air Force Base in Glendale.

There did appear to be some data from Davis-Monthan Air Force Base. But the zip code for that base listed five or fewer cases, versus more in adjoining zip codes.

Even some of the statewide data appears to lack specifics. The health department said it did not know the race or ethnicity of 63 percent of those with a confirmed diagnosis and 49 percent of those who actually died.


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