Florida Experiences Largest One-Day Spike In Coronavirus Deaths

MIAMI, FL — Florida reported its largest one-day spike of new coronavirus-related deaths Thursday amid a new surge of 8,935 more cases of the virus as a second 11-year-old child reportedly died from the illness in South Florida.

WPLG-TV identified the child as Yansi Ayala of Fort Lauderdale, who reportedly died Wednesday at Broward Health Medical Center. Last week an 11-year-old boy became the youngest person in Florida to die from the illness in nearby Miami-Dade County. Both children had underlying health issues.

Florida Gov. Ron DeSantis said he is working with Vice President Mike Pence and U.S. Health and Human Services Secretary Alex M. Azar to obtain an expedited shipment of remdesivir, an experimental antiviral medicine developed by Gilead Sciences, that has been in short supply throughout the state.

"The next shipment was scheduled sometime next week but we think we need to get it here as soon as possible," DeSantis acknowledged. "That's a big priority for our hospitals, and it's a big priority for our administration."

Speaking in Jacksonville, DeSantis said the state has sent 100 contract medical personnel, most of whom are nurses, to the Jackson Health System and another 100 nurses to the Tampa Bay area with more planned.

"We're going to bring in many more hundred to be able to help," DeSantis said, referring to hospitals in hard hit areas of the state. He said Health and Human Services officials also opened three new test sites in the Jacksonville area Wednesday. Those three test sites collectively processed 3,400 tests on the first day in addition to the tests performed at other sites.

The governor said 57,000 test results among nursing home staff members within the state had a positive test of only about 2.3 percent, which is much lower than state averages.

"Statewide we're looking at positivity of 10, 15 — even down in South Florida, 20 percent," the governor said. "Perhaps they are protecting themselves and they understand because of their work."

Restaurants in Miami-Dade County closed their indoor dining rooms Thursday while banquet halls and some other businesses were forced to shut down to stem the spread of the illness in Florida's hardest hit county.

Miami-Dade Mayor Carlos Gimenez announced Thursday his county was adding another 250 contact tracers, including 50 investigators, to the 300 contact tracers already working in the county, which includes the cities of Miami and Miami Beach.

Miami's ABC affiliate WPLG-TV reported that nine staffers tested positive, including at least three on-air personalities. Among them were evening anchor Nicole Perez and her husband, Roy Ramos, a reporter at the station. Perez fought back tears as she tried to find the words to describe the concern she was feeling for her husband.

Florida had a 9.9 percent positive test rate for the virus Thursday as the number of tests administered in the state reached 2,359,636. The percentage of positive cases has been increasing for more than three weeks and the cases have been trending younger.

Florida's record for the most one-day cases was set on the Fourth of July with a one-day spike of 11,458 cases.

The state's total positive cases rose to 232,718 from 223,783 over the previous 24-hour period. Many of the new positive cases in the state are of people between the ages of 33 to 37.

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The total number of deaths from the new coronavirus surpassed 4,000 among Floridians with a new total of 4,009, up from 3,889 a day earlier. State officials reported another 102 deaths in Florida involving non-Florida residents.

Twenty-three Florida counties reported 119 deaths Thursday. Florida health officials reported one additional death which Patch was unable to match to a county.

The daily total compares to 49 new deaths reported Wednesday, 63 new deaths Tuesday, 61 new deaths Monday, 28 new deaths Sunday, 18 new deaths Saturday, 64 new deaths Friday and 65 new deaths Thursday.

Miami-Dade County reported 24 new deaths. Broward County reported eight new deaths. Palm Beach County reported nine new deaths.

Hillsborough County reported 19 new deaths. Pinellas County reported 12 new deaths. Brevard County and Orange County each reported six new deaths.

Lee County, Polk County and Volusia County each reported five new deaths. Duval County reported four new deaths. Manatee County reported three new deaths.

Martin County reported two new deaths as did Sarasota County. Calhoun County reported one new death as did Escambia County, Indian River County, Lake County, Okaloosa County, Osceola County, Pasco County, Putnam County and Seminole County.

Health officials reported 17,167 hospitalizations up from 16,758 hospitalizations over the previous 24-hour period. That represents an increase of 409 new hospitalizations, which is also among the highest one-day increases.

Miami-Dade reported 55,961 cases of the virus Thursday. Nearby Broward County, which includes Fort Lauderdale, reported 25,102 cases. Palm Beach County, which includes Palm Beach and West Palm, reported 18,656 cases.

Those three counties account for 99,719 cases, or some 43 percent of the state's total.

Hillsborough County, which includes Tampa, reported 16,666 cases. Orange County, which includes Orlando, reported 15,595 cases.

In an effort to provide as much information to our readers as possible, Patch is publishing the following county-by-county breakdown of the coronavirus cases in Florida's 67 counties, along with the median age of patients, the number of hospital cases by county and the number of deaths.

Related:

• Miami-Dade Nearly Doubles Coronavirus Contact Tracers Amid Spike

• Miami ABC Affiliate WPLG-TV Reports 9 Coronavirus Cases

• Toxic Bleach Sold As 'Miracle' Coronavirus Cure: Feds

• Most Florida Children Expected To Attend Traditional Schools

• Masks Are Now Required In Lakeland Public Places: Commission

• Patch Survey: Too Soon To Send Kids Back To School

• Coronavirus Confrontation On South Beach Elevator

• Miami-Dade Mayor Reimposes Curfew Amid Coronavirus

• Jackson Health CEO Issues Dire Warning Over Coronavirus Spike

Patch updates this chart once each day based on data provided by the Florida Department of Health. The counties that reported new deaths on Thursday are shown in bold.

Here is the most recent data:

This article originally appeared on the Sarasota Patch