5K Floridians have died in the COVID-19 pandemic

More than 5,000 Floridians have died with COVID-19, according to the latest update from state health officials.

A Monday morning update from the Department of Health brought 90 resident fatalities, raising the death toll to 5,072. The state also confirmed the deaths of two non-residents, a total now of 111.

For more than a week, the state has counted more than 90 dead people each day. Thursday was the Sunshine State’s deadliest day of the pandemic, with 156 people confirmed dead.

Prior to the latest rash of deaths, the record numbers of confirmed deaths was 72 on May 5.

Deaths are a lagging indicator of the virus, coming at least three weeks behind upticks in cases. About five weeks ago, Florida began seeing multiple thousands of new cases daily.

With Monday morning’s update, 360,394 people, including 345,612 Floridians, have tested positive within the state. That comes after officials made 10,347 new diagnoses in the past 24 hours.

The new cases cover residents and non-residents confirmed positive Sunday morning to Monday morning. For all day Sunday, the state diagnosed 10,508 positive residents.

After two weeks of a downward trend in the percent positive results among prospective new cases, 14.7% tested positive Sunday. In that time, the daily rate has been as high as 18.5% and as low as 11.3%, all above the state’s target 10% threshold and the 3% that were testing positive in the second half of May.

Nearly 3.1 million individuals have been tested in Florida, including 78,993 Sunday. That is rising again but down from the record 142,965 individuals set on July 11.

The Department of Health has also counted an elevated number of hospitalizations, including 292 since Sunday’s report to raise the state’s total to 21,263. That includes the 9,454 the Agency for Health Care Administration currently shows hospitalized with the disease, about 136 more than about 24 hours earlier.

In an exclusive interview with Chris Wallace on Fox News Sunday, Trump defended his “embers” comment about the country’s COVID-19 cases, but with a caveat.

“We have embers, and we do have flames,” Trump said. “Florida became — more flamelike, but it’s going to be under control.”

On Friday, Gov. Ron DeSantis was asked if he takes responsibility for the thousands dead in the state. However, he declined to answer the question directly.

“I think every time you have fatalities for any reason, I think it’s a tragedy and we certainly have seen fatalities in Florida, particularly recently,” he said. “We’ve seen fatalities particularly in places down in Miami-Dade, and it’s a terrible, terrible thing.”

But a rising number of the state’s elderly population, an at-risk demographic for severe infects, have tested positive in the weeks since the median age of new cases plummeted from the 50s to the early 30s throughout the end of May and beginning of April.

Again Sunday the median age of people testing positive was 41. That’s been the metric’s ceiling since the state started reporting it when it was still in the low 30s.

As of Monday, 2,400 residents and staff of longterm care facilities have died with COVID-19, an increase of 30 from Sunday’s report.

On Wednesday, Florida crossed 300,000 COVID-19 cases. It took Florida 114 days to record its first 100,000 COVID-19 cases between March 1 and June 22. It took 13 days to record the second 100,000 and 10 days to reach the third.

To help combat the pandemic, DeSantis asked Monday for Floridians who have already warded off the disease to donate their plasma, which now contains antibodies against the COVID-19 virus.

“You can make a difference in people’s health and in their lives,” he said.

___

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.