Florida reports 4,794 new COVID-19 cases

Amber Randall, South Florida Sun Sentinel
·3 min read

FORT LAUDERDALE, Fla. — The number of COVID-19 cases in Florida declined slightly Sunday after almost a week of rising numbers.

Florida reported 4,794 new coronavirus cases on Sunday and another 22 new resident deaths linked to COVID-19. The state has now reported 2,081,826 cases since the pandemic began.

SOUTH FLORIDA

Palm Beach County: 325 additional cases and 0 more deaths. The county now has 133,286 confirmed cases and 2,713 deaths, including 52 non-residents.

Broward County: 720 additional cases and 2 more deaths. Broward has a known total of 217,780 cases and 2,747 deaths since the beginning of the pandemic. The death tally includes 46 non-residents.

Miami-Dade County: 1,128 additional cases and 17 new deaths. The county now has 451,019 confirmed cases and 5,959 deaths, including 42 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 7.02% on Sunday, up from 6.31% 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 68,714 COVID-19 tests of Florida residents received from labs in the past day, down from 93,055 results reported the day before.

The positivity rate has risen in Broward County slightly.

Palm Beach County: Test results for 5,339 residents were reported Sunday, leading to a daily positivity rate of 6.12%. That's down from 6.57% the previous day.

Broward County: Test results for 9,172 residents were reported Sunday, leading to a daily positivity rate of 7.93%. That's up from 7.16% the previous day.

Miami-Dade County: Test results for 17,475 residents were reported Sunday, leading to a daily positivity rate of 6.73%. That's down from 6.78% the previous day.

DEATHS

The numbers of hospitalized COVID-19 patients and deaths in South Florida have declined.

The state’s pandemic data report shows a total of 33,674 Floridians have died from COVID-19. In addition, 654 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 2,858 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 449, Palm Beach County had 170 and Miami-Dade had 522.

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-19 vaccine.

In Florida, 2,610,928 people have received their first dose of the vaccine, or about 12.16% of the population.

So far, 3,597,072 people have completed the series of doses required to be vaccinated. That represents about 16.75% of the population.

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