Scott Powers
The steadily-rising rate of positive results for people being tested for COVID-19 across Central Florida has taken off, topping 10% in the latest report from state authorities.
The combined positive test rate in the six counties of greater Orlando reached 10.7% for the 12,648 results returned Monday, according to the latest COVID-19 report from the Florida Department of Health.
That positive-test rate might be elevated because there were fewer test results returned Monday than the region has seen on any single day since Thanksgiving. Presumably the smaller sample included a higher concentration of people seeking tests because they feared they were exposed or already have symptoms.
Nonetheless, the latest results followed a trend that has shown the region’s positive-test result rate generally rising for a couple of weeks across Central Florida. The rate had plateaued in the range of 6-7% for several weeks prior to early December. It had been in the 8-10% range on most days in the past week.
Seminole County saw 13.9% of tests of its tested residents come back positive in the most recent batch of results. That was a new recent high, yet the third time in five days that Seminole’s positive-test rate was over 10%. In Osceola County, the rate was 11.7% in the latest batch; Orange County, 11.5%; Lake County, 10.4%; Brevard County, 9.8%; and Volusia County, 7.2%.
The composite rate for the entire state of Florida was 9.6% for Monday’s batch of COVID-19 test results.
The Central Florida region had not seen a one-day composite positive-test results over 10% since July. In July, it usually was much higher. On July 7, the region’s combined rate hit 15.7%. Among individual counties, Osceola’s rate hit 22.7% on July 14.
The six Central Florida counties combined for another 1,526 new COVID-19 cases confirmed in Tuesday’s state report. That made Tuesdays’ daily report the sixth in seven days in which the region showed more than 1,500 new cases in one day.
Orange recorded 678 new cases in the latest report; Osceola, 189; Seminole, 188; Brevard, 184; Volusia, 151; and Lake 136.
Central Florida also saw 40 more people admitted to hospitals with COVID-19 in the latest report, led by Brevard, with 10 new patients.
There were seven new deaths attributed to COVID-19 in Central Florida in Tuesday’s report. That included two people whose deaths were attributed by state authorities to COVID-19 in Brevard, two in Osceola, and two in Volusia.
