More than 2.5 million Floridians have now filed for unemployment since the pandemic began

Unemployment applications amid the coronavirus pandemic broke 2.5 million this week, according to the Florida Department of Economic Opportunity data reported Monday covering March 15-June 15.

Of those claims, about 2.3 million were unique and not duplicates.

The total number of claims is up about 400,000 from a week ago.

Meanwhile the number of claims processed in Florida has increased to about 2.2 million, or 92.2%.

The state found 1.19 million applicants are eligible for state and federal assistance. Another 21,298 are eligible federal pandemic emergency unemployment compensation, 212,846 are eligible for federal pandemic unemployment assistance and 484,361 are eligible for state and-or federal employment assistance.

The state has made payments to 1.39 million claimants in the past three months accounting for $6.28 billion in payments since the start of the pandemic.

Florida has picked up only a small portion of that tab. The state has paid $1.56 billion in unemployment compensation.

Federal dollars remain the main supply of financial relief for those seeking unemployment assistance. About $4.55 billion in federal dollars have been used for federal pandemic unemployment compensation. Another $145.1 million in federal money has been spent on pandemic unemployment assistance. And $27.1 million has been allocated to federal pandemic emergency unemployment compensation.