South Florida Sun-Sentinel Palm Beach (Sunday)
State has new 3,573 cases
63 deaths also reported Saturday; positivity rate firm
Another 3,573 people in Florida have tested positive for COVID-19 and 63 more have died from the disease, according to state reports released Saturday.
The daily testing positivity rate stood at 4.53% Saturday, the eighth straight day it came in below 5%, a key target for decisions whether to allow the resumption of normal life. The World Health Organization has said governments should achieve a daily positivity rate of 5% or less for two straight weeks.
The totals for deaths and new infections, which are neither the highest or lowest released over the past few weeks, come as South Florida continues to take steps toward reopening the economy.
Broward and MiamiDade counties moved into phase 2 of reopening last week, joining Palm Beach County in allowing more types of businesses to resume operations. Palm Beach County public school campuses reopen Monday. The Broward school district proposes reopening classrooms Oct. 5 and 12, in a plan to be discussed Tuesday by the school board.
Although the total of new infections is the most since Sept. 11, which registered 3,550 new cases, it’s far lower than the daily totals last month, which routinely topped 6,000. And while not a record low, the daily death count is lower than the 100-plus totals that have been more typical of the past two weeks.
Experts caution against drawing conclusions from a single day’s counts, since they are affected by factors such as how quickly test results and deaths are reported to authorities. But the longer-term trends are favorable. The disease produced its peak number of new daily cases in July, with deaths reaching their highest daily counts in August.
The new cases bring the total to 681,233 in Florida since the pandemic began, according to the Florida Department of Health, which posts daily updates. The total death count, which includes both Florida residents and non-Florida residents who died in the state, reached 13,450.
South Florida
233 new coronavirus cases were reported Saturday, bringing the total to 75,499. At least 1,345 people in Broward were reported to have died, two more than Friday’s total.
250 new cases were reported Saturday, bringing the total to 45,156. A total of 1,298 deaths were reported, five more than Friday.
536 new cases were reported Saturday, bringing the total to 166,516. A total of 3,076 people in MiamiDade were reported to have died from COVID-19. That’s 29 more than Friday’s total.
Hospitalizations
The number of people hospitalized for the disease continued to decline.
As of 12:30 p.m. Saturday, 2,267 people were hospitalized with a primary dia g n o s i s o f C OV I D -19 across the state. That’s 115 fewer than the previous day.
Since the pandemic began, a total of 42,374 state residents have been hospitalized for the disease in Florida, according to the Department of Health. That is an increase of 140 from the previous day’s numbers.
Broward County reported 228 patients currently hospitalized; Palm Beach County had 136; and Miami-Dade had the most in the state with 315.
The online report from the state Agency for Health Care Administration updates several t i me s throughout the day. Hospitalizations have been going down since hitting a peak in late July.
Testing
More than 5 million people have been tested for COVID-19 in Florida since the pandemic began, producing an overall positivity rate of 13.42%, state data show. At least 681,233 people have tested positive and 4.4 million people have tested negative.
The latest state report shows the daily positivity rate at 4.53%, up from 4.15% the previous day. This figure reflects only new infections based on COVID-19 testing for the day; it does not count people who previously tested positive for the disease.
Global view
The novel coronavirus has infected more than 30 million people and killed at least 953,482 worldwide, according to Johns Hopkins University’s Coronavirus Resource Center.
The United States has 6.7 million cases, the highest total in the world, with at least 198,921 deaths, the most of any country. The U.S. has 4.3% of the world’s population, but 22.2% of the world’s cases and 20.92% of the world’s deaths.
David Fleshler can be reached at dfleshler@ sun-sentinel.com.