Life in rural Alaska looks like a postcard until you zoom in on the details that do not make it into the travel brochures.

For too long, the safety of Alaska’s rural residents has been measured by what wasn’t there — too few law enforcement officers, too little support and too many delayed responses to violent crime.

A key step to preventing the spread of diseases like COVID-19 or influenza is simple: washing hands. But lack of piped water in parts of rural Alaska has made that simple practice not so easy to carry ...