Pandemic Deaths In Florida Spare No Age

From the Florida Phoenix: By Diane Rado - April 8, 2020

On a list of 254 COVID-19 deaths posted by the Florida Department of Health on Monday, one case stuck out:

For the first time in Florida, a man, age 100, died from the coronavirus. He was from Lee County, on the Gulf of Mexico side of of Florida, north of Naples. The health department posted the death as April 3, 2020.

The department’s list doesn’t provide much more detail than that.

But the Lee County man would have lived a century that included the polio epidemic and the dawning of an age of technology that would allow people to live longer. And he did.

But in the end he died from a virus that even experts still don’t understand.

The list of Florida deaths also included the youngest person so far who has died from the COVID-19 respiratory disease.

He was a man, age 28, from Sarasota County, who had traveled in Illinois and Florida. The death was listed as March 28, 2020.

For now, those two men are the two outliers in a list of 254 deaths that inevitably will grow as the number of infections rise, with many people surviving the illness, though not all.

As of Monday evening, the state health department reported 13,629 infections across 63 of 67 counties in Florida.

Only four small rural counties still have zero infections. If the level of increases continue, it’s likely infections will be at 20,000 in a week in Florida.

The data of death cases analyzed by the Florida Phoenix show that of the 254 coronavirus death cases, the average age of death was 75.

Overall, 33 people in their 90s died; 72 people died in their 80s; 73 people died in their 70s; 44 in their 60s, 16 in their 50s, 9 in their 40s and 5 in thier 30s.

This story was originally published by the Florida Phoenix. For more stories from the Florida Phoenix, visit FloridaPhoenix.com.