First Coast shatters 10,000 coronavirus cases

The five-county First Coast area blasted past 10,000 total coronavirus cases and three counties set new records for the percentage of positive test results, according to Florida Department of Health data released Friday.

The Northeast Florida region jumped by 936 cases Wednesday through Thursday morning, arriving at 10,351 people who’ve now been infected with the illness.

Jacksonville accounts for a majority of those cases at 7,961 infections, up by 714 over Thursday’s record-setting report.

Equally alarming is Duval County’s percentage of positive coronavirus test results, which set a new local high mark Thursday. Jacksonville recorded a 16.3% positive return rate on tests for the illness. Jacksonville’s positivity rate hasn’t been below 10% since June 24 and in the past week has averaged 14.2%.

St. Johns County also set some local records. The St. Johns total daily case count increased by 120 infections, a new record as it arrived at 1,188 total cases.

The percentage of positive COVID-19 test results jumped to 13.9%, a record high. The average daily positivity rate now stands at 10.8% in St. Johns County.

Clay County also set a new record for positive test results with 70 new cases, now at 871 total. The positivity rate in Clay County jumped to 14.7%, a record for the second day in a row. Clay averaged 10.1% over the past week.

Elsewhere on the First Coast, Nassau County increased by 28 new cases and Baker County saw an uptick of four new cases.

No new deaths were recorded on the First Coast Thursday, holding steady at 115 for the region. There are now 582 hospitalizations attributed to coronavirus in Northeast Florida.

Across Florida, there are 178,594 COVID-19 cases, 3,684 deaths and 15,491 hospitalizations.

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Editor’s note on methodology: The Florida Department of Health releases new data every morning around 10:45 a.m. The total number reported in those daily reports include the previous day’s totals as well as the most up to date data as of about 9:30 a.m.

Florida Politics uses the report-over-report increase to document the number of new cases each day because it represents the most up-to-date data available. Some of the more specific data, including positivity rates and demographics, considers a different data set that includes only cases reported the previous day.

This is important to note because the DOH report lists different daily totals than our methodology to show day-over-day trends. Their numbers do not include non-residents who tested positive in the state and they only include single-day data, therefore some data in the DOH report may appear lower than what we report.

Our methodology was established based on careful consideration among our editorial staff to capture both the most recent and accurate trends.