Florida’s COVID-19 daily case total is second-lowest since June as state surpasses 600K
Florida’s Department of Health on Sunday confirmed 2,974 additional cases of COVID-19, bringing the state’s known total to 600,571. There were also 51 Florida resident deaths announced, bringing the resident death toll to 10,325.
There were no new non-resident deaths, leaving the non-resident toll at 137.
Sunday’s newly confirmed cases is the second lowest single day count reported since June. On Monday, Florida reported 2,678 cases.
Throughout the pandemic, the newly confirmed cases reported on Sundays have tended to be lower than the other days of the week because fewer people work in labs and enter data on the weekends.
Confimed COVID-19 cases in South Florida
Note: The Florida Department of Health says that each county’s percent positivity for new cases (people who tested positive for the first time) does not include retests (people who have tested positive once and are being tested for a second time).
▪ Miami-Dade County reported 772 additional confirmed cases of COVID-19, and five new deaths, according to Florida’s Department of Health. The county now has 151,986 confirmed cases and 2,243 deaths. Percent positivity for new cases: 8.55%
▪ Broward County reported 245 additional confirmed cases of the disease and 25 new deaths. The county now has a known total of 69,136 cases and 1,113 deaths. Percent positivity for new cases: 4.38%
▪ Palm Beach County saw 183 additional confirmed cases and no new deaths. The county now has 40,570 confirmed cases and 1,059 deaths. Percent positivity for new cases: 3.54%
▪ Monroe County decreased its total confirmed cases of 1,694 by one and did not report any new deaths. It now has a total of 1,693 confirmed cases and 14 deaths. Percent positivity for new cases: 3.92%
While it wasn’t immediately clear why the count change occurred, officials have previously said that count changes sometimes occur during the contact tracing investigation when it is later determined that the person is a resident from another county.
COVID-19 hospitalizations in Florida
One of the tools that officials rely on to determine whether 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 Florida Agency for Health Care Administration reports the number of patients hospitalized statewide with a “primary diagnosis of COVID.” The data, which is updated at least every hour, does not distinguish between the number of COVID-19 patients in hospital intensive care units and those in acute-care beds, which require less attention from nurses.
Previously, the state was only providing the total number of hospitalizations in its statewide and county-level data. Miami-Dade was an exception, with hospitals self-reporting a number of key metrics, including hospitalizations, to the county, which has made this data public for several months.
As of 3:46 p.m. Sunday, there were 4,580 COVID-19 patients admitted into hospitals throughout the state, according to the Florida Agency for Health Care Administration dashboard.
Of those, 883 were in Miami-Dade, 600 in Broward, 251 in Palm Beach and 4 in Monroe counties, according to the agency.
Florida’s current hospitalization data does not always match the hospitalization data reported in Miami-Dade’s “New Normal” dashboard. Officials say this could be for a number of reasons including the frequency of daily updates.
On Sunday, Miami-Dade hospitalizations for COVID-19 complications decreased from 1,038 to 1,019, according to Miami-Dade County’s “New Normal” dashboard. According to Sunday’s data, 75 people were discharged and 56 people were admitted.
The state has had a total of 36,468 Florida residents hospitalized for COVID-19-related complications, according to Florida’s COVID-19 Data and Surveillance Dashboard.
COVID-19 Testing in Florida
Testing in Florida has seen steady growth since the COVID-19 crisis began.
Testing, like hospitalizations, helps officials determine the virus’ progress and plays a role in deciding whether it is safe to lift stay-at-home orders and loosen restrictions.
Epidemiologists then use the testing data to create a positive rate. The rate helps them determine if a rise in cases is because of an increase in testing, or if it means there’s increased transmission of the virus in the community.
On Sunday, Florida’s Department of Health reported the results of 61,686 people tested on Saturday. The positive rate of new cases (people who tested positive for the first time) was 5.52%.
If retests are included — people who have tested positive once and are being tested for a second time — the positive rate for Wednesday’s testing was 8.61% of the total, according to the report.
In total, 6,016,043 tests have been conducted. To date, 4,435,417 people have been tested in Florida. Of the total tested, 600,571 (13.54%) have tested positive. The state says there are 3,568 tests with pending results.
This story was originally published August 23, 2020 at 11:10 AM with the headline "Florida’s COVID-19 daily case total is second-lowest since June as state surpasses 600K."
