Death toll tops 1,200

Broward, Miami-Dade and Palm Beach counties have had 1,211 deaths from the new coronavirus, state officials reported Friday. That’s an increase of 120 fatalities from one week earlier.

State Health Department reports show the three counties accounted for 28,174 cases as of Friday, which is an increase of 2,639 cases since last week, and 776 over the previous 24 hours.

The three counties, home to 28.9% of Florida’s population, have had 55.3% of the state’s coronavirus deaths and 57% of the cases.

So far, 2,190 people across Florida have died from coronavirus-caused illness, which is an increase of 46 over the past 24 hours.

The state data also shows there have been 49,451 people who have been diagnosed with COVID-19 since the outbreak began earlier this year. That’s an 776 cases more than Thursday.

Gov. Ron DeSantis said Friday that he’s encouraged by lower percentages of positive COVID-19 tests in the data. At a news conference in Jacksonville he said that in the past week only 3% or fewer of those tested were diagnosed with infections.

“Our positivity rate is very, very low ... even though we’ve expanded testing dramatically,” he said, adding that a chunk of the new cases are coming from longterm care facilities with elderly residents who are most vulnerable to the disease.

With 837,172 people swabbed so far — the state population is 21.5 million — the data shows a total to date of about 5.9% positive statewide and 8.8% in South Florida, which has more cases than anywhere else in the state.

A month ago, on April 22, it was about 10% statewide and 13.3% in South Florida.

Since the pandemic began, 9,117 people have been treated in Florida hospitals, the state reported, an increase of 171 over the last day.

Friday’s Department of Health data shows the following breakdown:

Miami-Dade County, the Florida coronavirus hot spot, has had 16,522 cases, an increase of 155 from Thursday. The number of Miami-Dade County deaths, 614, is 12 more than it was a day earlier. Miami-Dade County, which has 13% of the state’s population, has 33.4% of the state’s cases and 28% of the deaths.

Broward has had 6,580 cases, 66 more than Thursday. It has had 286 deaths, same as the day before.

Palm Beach County has had 5,072 cases, 104 more than Thursday. It has had 311 deaths, up three from Thursday.

Testing trends

The percentage of people diagnosed with the disease has been steadily declining in South Florida. As of Friday, Miami-Dade County had tested 154,665 people, and 10.7% of those tests were positive for COVID-19. But a month ago, 16% of those swabbed were confirmed positive in that county.

In Broward, there have been 89,963 people tested, according to the reports. Of those, 7.3% were positive, a drop from 12% on April 22.

And in Palm Beach County, there have been 61,100 tests, with

8.3% positive. That’s down from 12% one month ago.

U.S., global view

The coronavirus death toll in the United States stood at 94,729 on Friday morning, including at least than 39,589 victims in the national hot spots of New York and New Jersey.

The country has almost 1.6 million cases.

The Center for Systems Science and Engineering at Johns Hopkins University also reported more than 5.1 million cases worldwide. At least 333,489 people have died.

The United States has 4.3% of the world’s population, 28.4% of the world’s deaths and 30.7% of the world’s cases.