Florida confirms nearly 9,000 coronavirus cases in a single day, a new record

A record week of surging coronavirus numbers was only heightened on Friday, as state health officials confirmed 8,942 cases, nearly doubling the previous record of cases reported in a single day, two days earlier.

Florida’s Department of Health on Friday morning confirmed the cases, bringing the state total to 122,960. The state also announced at least 39 new deaths, bringing the total of COVID-19 deaths north of 3,360.

Over the last seven days, Florida has reported 29,163 new cases. That’s nearly a quarter of all the confirmed cases in the state so far.

The alarming case total came on a day of record testing, but the percentage of tests coming back positive remains elevated beyond the 10% threshold recommended by public health experts. On Friday, test results for 71,433 people were reported, and 14.74% of those tests came back positive.

How many confirmed COVID-19 cases are in South Florida?

Miami-Dade County saw 1,528 new cases at 14.3% positivity. It was the highest single-day case total of the pandemic despite not being the highest number of test results returned in one day. The county’s known total is now at 30,196. The death toll is at 946, the highest in the state.

Broward County saw 750 new cases at 11.7% positivity. The county’s confirmed case total is now at 13,320. The death toll is now at 381.

Palm Beach County saw 654 new cases at 10.8% positivity. The county’s confirmed case total is now at 12,498. The death toll is 490.

Monroe County saw 15 new cases. The Florida Keys has had a total of 202 cases and 4 deaths.

Hospitalizations in Florida

One of the tools that officials are relying on to determine if the coronavirus situation is improving in the state is hospitalization data. Unlike testing, which might be limited or take days to report results, hospitalizations can help give officials a real-time snapshot of how many people are severely ill with COVID-19.

The state health department says it does not “have a figure” to reflect the number of people currently hospitalized and only provides the total number of hospitalizations in its statewide and county-level data. On Friday, 212 hospitalizations were added, bringing the statewide total to 13,987.

While Florida’s Department of Health is not releasing current statewide hospitalization data to the public, hospitals in Miami-Dade are self-reporting a number of key metrics, including hospitalizations, to the county, which has made this data public. Some provide updates every day; others don’t.

On Friday, Miami-Dade hospitalizations for COVID-19 complications hit another all-time high with a total of 994 patients, according to Miami-Dade County’s “New Normal” dashboard data. Also, 135 people were discharged and 122 people were admitted.

The number of admitted Miami-Dade patients has been steadIly increasing since June 15 when the county had 607 patients.

While a record number of COVID-19 patients are filling Miami-Dade hospitals, with one medical center in Homestead reaching ICU capacity on Tuesday, hospitals countywide say they still have more beds available.

Hospital administrators say there is also a silver lining in the growing number of new cases and hospitalizations in Florida’s hardest-hit county: The patients are younger and not as severely ill as they were during the first wave in April, and doctors and nurses have gained valuable experience in the months-long pandemic — leading to shorter hospital stays and better outcomes.

Scientists are also still working to learn more about the virus, including how many people in the community are infected and have mild or no symptoms, which can make it difficult to determine what percentage of the cases hospitalizations represent.

This story was updated to correct the number of new statewide deaths reported on Friday.

This story was originally published June 26, 2020 at 11:18 AM with the headline "Florida confirms nearly 9,000 coronavirus cases in a single day, a new record."