Staff Reports
State health officials confirmed 47 deaths due to complications from COVID-19 since Tuesday’s report, raising Florida’s death toll to 1,218.
With 347 new confirmed cases on Wednesday, 33,193 people, including 875 non-Floridians, have tested positive for the novel coronavirus. Another 197 Floridians were hospitalized, bringing the pandemic total to 5,419.
Tuesday’s 83 fatalities were a spike from the downward trend in deaths, but that report doesn’t reflect how many people died that day. Rather, the reports show how many deceased Floridians the state confirmed.
The 47 deaths on Wednesday are still above the recent trend, which saw 29 people confirmed dead Sunday and 19 on Monday.
Three in five of the state’s COVID-19 cases are concentrated in Miami-Dade, Broward and Palm Beach counties, which have been ongoing hot spots for the virus during the outbreak. South Florida represents a growing share of confirmed cases as the influx of new cases in other urban areas slows to a trickle.
In Miami-Dade, DOH reported 11,927 cases and 338 deaths, an increase from 11,831 and 324 respectively. In Broward, the state has confirmed 4,898 cases, up from 4,847 , and 182 deaths, an increase of three over Monday. In Palm Beach, 2,911 people have tested positive, an increase from 2,877 , and an additional five Floridians died, pushing the death toll there to 178.
Lee joined those three counties, as well as Orange, Hillsborough and Duval counties, as the seventh with more than 1,000 COVID-19 cases, now with 1,003 cases and 41 deaths. Duval earned the dubious distinction Tuesday, now with 1,007 cases and 20 deaths.
Statewide, the number of positive tests among people who had not previously tested negative was down to 4.7% Tuesday from 8.7% two weeks before. A dropping percentage of new positives indicates the outbreaks in Florida are in decline.
Gov. Ron DeSantis has pointed to the Orlando, Tampa and Jacksonville areas as metropolitan communities that have controlled the spread of the coronavirus.
The Governor is expected to make an announcement on the findings of his Re-Open Florida Task Force, which met throughout the previous workweek.
In the first quarter of 2020, the national gross domestic product dropped 4.8%, the first quarterly drop in six years. The GDP report showed that the weakness was led by consumer spending, which accounts for 70% of economic activity, plummeting 7.6% in the first quarter.
