Polk County's COVID-19 infection rate continues to rise, Florida Department of Health reports

Gary White, The Ledger
·2 min read

New infections of COVID-19 and the rate of positive test results continue to push upward in Polk County.

The county registered another 3,021 cases for the week of July 8-14, according to a biweekly update released late Friday afternoon by the Florida Department of Health. That indicated an increase of 2.8% from the previous report.

The county’s positivity rate climbed to 23%. The state had reported it at 22.1% in the update from July 1.

The county registered another 3,021 cases for the week of July 8-14, according to a biweekly update released late Friday afternoon by the Florida Department of Health.
The county registered another 3,021 cases for the week of July 8-14, according to a biweekly update released late Friday afternoon by the Florida Department of Health.

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Polk County’s positivity rate has only surpassed 20% during the worst waves of the pandemic and had been as low as 2.9% in April. The rate does not include results of home testing.

Statewide, infections rose 5.1% compared to the previous update, with 78,245 new infections recorded. The positivity rate for all testing in Florida spiked to 21.2%, up from 19.4% two weeks earlier.

The Department of Health registered another 772 COVID-related deaths, slightly lower than the figure from the July 1 update. The state has tallied 76,662 deaths since spring of 2020.

The state does not report deaths by county of residence. The federal Centers for Disease Control and Prevention recorded 13 deaths of Polk County residents related to COVID in the week ending Thursday. That indicated a rise of 30% from a week earlier.

Polk County is still rated high for community levels of COVID-19, according to the CDC’s COVID Data Tracker.

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The CDC registered 254 hospital admissions for COVID-19 in the previous week, an increase of 27.5% from the previous week. Patients confirmed to have COVID-19 occupied 8.1% of staff, in-patient beds in Polk County hospitals, according to the CDC.

A graphic on the CDC website shows that hospital admissions for COVID-19 have risen steadily in Polk County since early May.

The CDC reported the positivity rate for Polk County at 23.4%, a slight increase from a week earlier.

The CDC’s dashboard listed 71.5% of Polk County residents age 5 and older as having received at least one dose of a vaccine, with 61.6% fully vaccinated.

Among fully vaccinated residents, 40.1% have received at least one booster dose, according to the CDC.

Gary White can be reached at gary.white@theledger.com or 863-802-7518. Follow on Twitter @garywhite13.

This article originally appeared on The Ledger: Polk's COVID cases rise, omicron BA.5 subvariant dominant in Florida