Community Corner
Florida's Rapid Rise In Coronavirus Infections
Count nearly at 12,000 infected with nearly 200 deaths in half of state's counties.
From the Florida Phoenix: By Diane Rado - April 5, 2020
When COVID-19 infections for the first time reached the 10,000 mark Friday evening, the increases didn’t stop: Within 24 hours, a rapid rise in cases put the total at 11,545 by Saturday evening.
That means 1,277 more infections were reported between Friday and Saturday evenings, according to Florida Department of Health data.
Find out what's happening in Across Floridafor free with the latest updates from Patch.
The same jump occurred between Thursday evening and Friday evening, with 1,260 more infections in that time span.
If those kind of increases continue — meaning around 1,200 new cases every 24 hours — Florida could be at 20,000 infections in about a week.
Find out what's happening in Across Floridafor free with the latest updates from Patch.
The increases have been fueled by more testing, particularly in commercial and hospital labs rather than public health departments.
The COVID-19 infections are caused by the new coronavirus that has expanded across the globe.
Overall, 62 of 67 counties in Florida have at least one infection and there’s only five counties left that have zero infections: Gilchrist, Hamilton, Lafayette, Liberty and Taylor in north Florida.
(The state has an “unknown” category that is not a county but has 10 cases.)
As of Saturday evening, Miami-Dade was closing in on 4,000 infections, and Broward, about 1800. Palm Beach is close to reaching 1,000 cases. The three counties in South Florida have been the center of the coronavirus pandemic in Florida.
Saturday evening’s numbers also reflect a rise in death cases, now at 195. Those same three counties continue to have the most deaths.
Overall, 32 counties — about half the counties in Florida — have at least one death.
Those counties are: Bay, Broward, Charlotte, Citrus, Clay, Collier, DeSoto, Duval, Escambia, Flagler, Highlands, Hillsborough, Lake, Lee, Manatee, Miami-Dade, Monroe, Okaloosa, Orange, Osceola, Palm Beach, Pasco, Pinellas, Polk, Putnam, Santa Rosa, Sarasota, St. Johns, St. Lucie, Seminole, Sumter and Volusia.
You can go on the Florida Department of Health’s website to look at COVID-19 data. It’s called the COVID-19 Data and Surveillance Dashboard.
This story was originally published by the Florida Phoenix. For more stories from the Florida Phoenix, visit FloridaPhoenix.com.
