Alabama had more people die last year during the onset of the Covid-19 pandemic than births "This past year, 2020, is going to be the first year that we know of in the history of our state where we actually had more deaths than births," Alabama Health Officer Dr. Scott Harris said Friday during a news briefing. "Our state literally shrunk," he said. Preliminary data shows that 64,714 people died in Alabama in 2020 while there were 57,641 births In 2019, the state recorded 54,109 deaths and 58,615 births, according to the health department. According to state data, 7,182 people in Alabama died due to Covid-19 in 2020 and total Covid-19 deaths reached 13,209 as of Saturday. Covid-19 deaths and hospitalizations have been rising over the past few months -- and it's not impacting everywhere equally. In Alabama 41% of people are fully vaccinated, according CDC More bed space has opened recently however: "It is not because these patients are miraculously getting better and going home. It's because they're dying," Dr. Kierstin Kennedy, the chief of hospital medicine at the University of Alabama Medicine. Of Alabama's 67 counties, 65 have a "high" level of coronavirus transmission, and two are at the "substantial" tier, state data shows. Most of the vaccinated patients she has seen get extremely sick or die are older or have significant co-morbidities that negatively affect their immune systems. Otherwise it’s a surge of the unvaccinated almost exclusively The governor urged people to get vaccinated to protect themselves and others as well as to help the state's economy recover.