Nearly 30% of population fully vaccinated, data shows

Florida reported 3,841 new coronavirus cases on Sunday and another 29 new resident deaths linked to COVID-19. The state has now reported 2,242,778 cases since the pandemic began.

The pandemic has killed more than 575,000 people in the U.S.

Worldwide, more than 152.3 million people have tested positive for COVID19 and more than 3.19 million people have died while battling the coronavirus.

The U.S. has more confirmed cases and deaths than any other country in the world. As of Sunday, more than 32.3 million Americans have tested positive for COVID-19 and at least 576,797 people have died across the U.S., as reported by Johns Hopkins University.

India has reported the second most cases, with more than 19.5 million, followed by Brazil with 14.7 million. Brazil has reported more deaths, with a tally of 406,437 compared to 217,168 in Mexico and 215,542 in India.

Florida officials issued no outdoor mask mandate for the pandemic.

Palm Beach and Broward counties did, but are relaxing those rules now that the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention has said fully vaccinated Americans no longer need to cover their faces unless they are in a large crowd.

With half of its residents already vaccinated, Broward has relaxed its outdoor pandemic rules, saying people can go without masks at outdoor gatherings, golf courses, community pools and poolside bars.

Palm Beach County has also altered its mask mandate, saying fully vaccinated people can go maskfree if outdoors and able to social distance. The new rule went into effect Saturday.

“Fully vaccinated people can participate in outdoor activities and recreation without a facial covering or mask, except in certain crowded settings and venues where there is a decreased ability to maintain physical distance,” the new order says.

South Florida

Palm Beach County: 238 additional cases and no more deaths. The county now has 143,709 confirmed cases and 2,824 deaths, including 54 non-residents.

Broward County: 475 additional cases and 2 more deaths. Broward has a known total of 237,067 cases and 2,952 deaths since the beginning of the pandemic. The death tally includes 48 non-residents.

Miami-Dade County: 786 additional cases and 7 new deaths. The county now has 485,300 confirmed cases and 6,229 deaths, including 47 non-residents.

Testing and positivity

Public health experts say the virus is considered under control when the COVID-19 test positivity rate is under 5%. But since Oct. 29, Florida has exceeded 5% in its widely publicized calculation for assessing the rate for testing of residents.

The state reported a daily positivity rate of 5.87% on Sunday, up from 5.70% the day before. This method of calculating positivity counts new infections only, but also counts repeat negative tests, which skews the figure downward.

According to the state, the new reported case numbers reflect the results of 66,674 COVID-19 tests of Florida residents received from labs in the past day, down from 95,253 results reported the day before.

Palm Beach County: Test results for 5,003 residents were reported Sunday, leading to a daily positivity rate of 4.76%. That’s down from 4.79% the previous day.

Broward County: Test results for 8,994 residents were reported Sunday, leading to a daily positivity rate of 5.21%. That’s down from 5.35% the previous day.

Miami-Dade County: Test results for 14,440 residents were reported Sunday, leading to a daily positivity rate of 5.71%. That’s down from 5.80% the previous day.

Deaths

The number of hospitalized COVID patients and deaths in South Florida have been on the decline.

The state’s pandemic data report shows a total of 35,268 Floridians have died from COVID-19. In addition, 700 non-residents have died after contracting the virus. Most of the fatalities reported Sunday happened over several weeks but were just confirmed in the past day.

Out of all 50 states and the District of Columbia, Florida ranks No. 23 for deaths per 100,000 residents and No. 16 for cases per 100,000 residents, according to the latest data from the health department and the COVID Tracking Project.

Hospitalizations

As of Sunday, there were 3,080 people hospitalized in Florida with a primary diagnosis of COVID-19, according to the state Agency for Health Care Administration.

In South Florida, Broward County reported 432, Palm Beach County had 204 and Miami-Dade had 493.

Hospitalizations hit a peak in late July of about 9,500 patients statewide.

Vaccines

More than 5.67 million people in Florida have received at least one dose of a COVID vaccine.

In Florida, 2,584,625 people have received their first dose of the vaccine, or about 12.03% of the population.

So far, 6,280,675 people have completed the series of doses required to be vaccinated. That represents about 29.24% of the population.