87 more Manatee patients test positive for COVID-19 as Florida surpasses 100,000 cases
Eighty-seven more patients tested positive for COVID-19 in Manatee County on Monday, according to the latest information from the Florida Department of Health.
A total of 1,977 people have tested positive for the novel coronavirus in Manatee. The county’s death toll from the virus remains at 126.
Monday’s test result also represents a milestone in Florida as the number of statewide positive results broke the 100,000 mark. More than 2,900 new cases were reported, bringing the state’s total to 100,217.
A Miami Herald analysis of public and non-public COVID-19 data found that through June 3, new cases in Florida had consistently been trending up since mid-May and the trends could not be attributed solely to increases in testing.
And as bars, gyms, vacation rentals and movie theaters reopened at partial capacity in all but three South Florida counties, the number and rate of new COVID-19 cases were rising statewide — a troubling indicator that the disease could be spreading more quickly.
Florida Gov. Ron DeSantis said last week that another shutdown is not in the plans.
“We’re not rolling back,” DeSantis said during a news conference Tuesday when asked whether he would consider stopping some reopening efforts. “The reason we did the mitigation was to protect the hospital system.“
More than half of the state’s known COVID-19 cases are in South Florida’s four counties: Miami-Dade, Broward, Palm Beach and Monroe. Miami-Dade continues to lead the state with the most confirmed cases and deaths. It has 26,239 confirmed cases and 884 deaths.
One of the tools that officials are relying on to determine if the coronavirus situation is improving in the state is hospitalization data. Unlike testing, which might be limited or take days to report results, hospitalizations can help give officials a real-time snapshot of how many people are severely ill with COVID-19.
The health department says it does not “have a figure” to reflect the number of people currently hospitalized and only provides the total number of hospitalizations in its statewide and county-level data. On Monday, 82 hospitalizations were added, bringing the statewide total to 13,119.
While Florida’s Department of Health is not releasing current statewide hospitalization data to the public, hospitals in Miami-Dade are self-reporting a number of key metrics, including hospitalizations, to the county, which has made this data public. Some provide updates every day; others don’t.
On Sunday, 65 people were discharged and 105 people were admitted to Miami-Dade hospitals, bringing the number of hospitalizations for COVID-19 complications to 714, the highest it has been since April, according to Miami-Dade County’s “New Normal” dashboard data.
Scientists are also still working to learn more about the virus, including how many people in the community are infected and have mild or no symptoms, which can make it difficult to determine what percentage of the cases hospitalizations represent.
Testing in Florida has seen steady growth since the COVID-19 crisis began.
Testing, like hospitalizations, helps officials determine the virus’ progress and plays a role in deciding whether it is safe to lift stay-at-home orders and loosen restrictions.
The recommended number of daily tests needed varies among experts, but the dean of the University of South Florida’s College of Medicine told the governor that Florida needs to test about 33,000 people every day.
Florida’s Department of Health reported 37,169 new tests on Sunday in Monday’s daily COVID-19 update. The positive rate was 8.98% of the total, according to the report. In total, 1,911,676 tests have been conducted.
To date, 1,618,540 people have been tested in Florida. Of the total tested, 100,217 (about 6.19%) have tested positive. The state says there are 1,546 tests with pending results.
Health experts have previously told the Miami Herald that they were concerned the number of pending results listed by the state is an undercount. This is because Florida’s Health Department only announces the number of pending test results from state labs, not private ones — and private labs are completing more than 90% of state tests.
Previously, it has taken as long as two weeks for pending test results from private labs to be added into the state’s official count, making it difficult for officials to project the size and scale of the pandemic in the state. It’s unclear how quickly results are currently being sent to the state from private labs, as the turnaround time varies by lab.
Manatee County cases from Sunday to Monday:
- The number of cumulative positive cases increased from 1,890 to 1,977.
- The number of deaths remained at 126.
- Resident hospitalizations since the outbreak began increased by two to 249.
- The number of males infected is 919, compared to 1,035 females.
- The number of residents tested increased to 32,592.
The county’s test positive rate increased for the fourth day in a row and now stands at 6.1%, compared to 5.1% two weeks ago and 6.7% a month ago.
461 cases (25% of all cases) were among residents and staff of long-term care facilities in Manatee. (Another six deaths tied to care facilities were reported over the past week, bringing the total to 86.)
Sarasota County cases from Sunday to Monday:
- The number of cases increased from 962 to 992.
- The death toll remained at 94.
- The number of resident hospitalizations since the outbreak began increased by one to 183.
- The number of residents tested increased to 30,735.
- The number of males infected is 439 compared to 527 females.
- Sarasota County’s test positive rate remained at 3.2% Monday. That compares to 2.8% last week and 4.8% a month ago.
Florida cases from Sunday to Monday:
- The number of cases increased from 97,291 to 100,217.
- The death toll increased from 3,161 to 3,173
- The statewide test positive rate is 6.2% compared to 5.4% last week and 5.8% a month ago.
This story will be updated.
This story was originally published June 22, 2020 at 11:27 AM.
