Ryan Nicol
Miami-Dade County now has more than 1,700 confirmed cases of the novel coronavirus. That’s according to the latest update from state officials Monday evening.
The county hits that benchmark just two days after it recorded its 1,000th case. The number of positive tests has increased 70% during that two-day span.
The city of Miami alone accounts for more than half of the county’s cases. Officials have already logged 931 patients inside Miami, meaning it too will soon eclipse the 1,000-case mark.
Broward County — one county to the north — has seen 1,137 positive tests according to state officials. Palm Beach County, which is one more county upward, has recorded 463 confirmed cases.
Those three counties rank first, second and third among the state’s 67 counties as South Florida holds its place as the hotbed of the virus in the state. The three counties account for nearly 58% of Florida’s cases.
Still, it’s not all bad news for the region. Monday, Gov. Ron DeSantis said about 30% of the hospital beds in the state of Florida remain available right now — with a higher percentage available in both Broward and Miami-Dade.
Should the coronavirus continue to spread, however, that surplus may be exhausted.
The recent increase in positive tests in the region is driven in part by efforts to ramp up testing capacity. The more people tested, the more positive cases there will be.
Those efforts will continue Tuesday morning with a new site set to open in Palm Beach County. In his Friday remarks announcing the site, DeSantis noted Palm Beach had received far fewer tests than Broward and Miami-Dade, which could contribute in part to the lower number of verified positives.
“I think it’s important to expand the testing there so that we can get a better sense of what’s going on,” DeSantis said.
But dramatic social distancing efforts are also being installed to ensure the virus does not spread significantly further and lead to a crisis in the region’s hospital system.
To that end, the Governor announced an Executive Order Monday setting a “safer-at-home” framework spanning Palm Beach, Broward, Miami-Dade and Monroe counties.
“You have a community here that is our most densely population part of the state,” DeSantis said during a Monday news conference in Miami Gardens.
“You have a community here — and Miami International [Airport] — that receives a lot of international travel, certainly has over the last few months. Then you have a lot of interaction between Southeast Florida and New York City. So that has provided more seeds to have the virus in Southeast Florida.”
