Florida adds almost 9,000 new COVID cases — Miami-Dade tops 2K for 11th time in December
The State of Florida’s COVID-19 dashboard reported 8,958 new confirmed COVID-19 cases Sunday, a count under 10,000 after six of the previous days had been above 10,000.
For a Sunday, however, which tends go have lower case and death counts because there’s less data collection and entry on the weekends, it’s the highest case number since Nov. 15’s 10,105.
The daily death toll stayed in the 80 to triple digits range that it’s been in since Nov. 30. With another 84 total deaths, Florida’s novel coronavirus pandemic totals stand at 1,125,931 cases, 19,866 resident deaths and 20,133 total deaths.
As for the positive test rate, it was reported as 7.89% for the day. The average daily positive test rate for the last seven days, 8.02%, showed a downward trend from the previous seven days, 8.26%.
South Florida’s counties reflected that trend.
South Florida counties’ COVID cases and deaths
Miami-Dade County reported 2,395 more people who tested positive and 16 more COVID-19 deaths, putting its pandemic totals at 257,857 cases and 3,981 deaths. The positive test rate on Saturday was 9.37%. The state’s county-by-county breakdown says the average daily positive test rate fell from 9.27% for Nov. 29 through Dec. 5 to 8.36% for Dec. 6 through Saturday.
▪ Broward County reported another 737 cases and 11 deaths, moving its totals to 120,166 cases and 1,741 deaths. Broward’s average daily positive test rate decreased from 7.86% for Nov. 29 through Dec. 5 to 7.16% for Dec. 6 through Saturday. The positive test rate was 7.19% on Saturday
▪ Palm Beach County reported 461 new cases (72,708 for the pandemic), and two deaths (1,768). And the average daily positive test rate edged down to 7.15% the last seven days from 7.63% the previous seven days. Saturday’s positive rate was 6.04%
▪ Monroe County reported 24 new cases and no new deaths. Pandemic totals in the Keys are 3,821 cases and 28 deaths.
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Current hospitalizations
Government officials use current hospitalizations to decide the next action in dealing with the pandemic. On the state level, this has been steadily falling over the last month.
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.
As of 10:30 a.m. Sunday, the AHCA said there were 4,683 people currently hospitalized, a jump of 193 from 9 a.m. Saturday. Compared to Saturday, Miami-Dade was up 82 to 883; Broward was up 36 to 478; Palm Beach was up 13 to 289; and Monroe was up one to seven.
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.
Sunday, Miami-Dade reported 854 people admitted to the hospital from COVID-19, an decrease of seven people from Saturday and three from a week ago after bouncing all the way up to 906 on Dec. 7. The number of patients in Intensive Care Unit Beds slid for the third consecutive day, down to 173.
