Scott Powers
The COVID-19 pandemic raged to new levels beyond what was seen during the summer surge as more than 3,000 new cases were confirmed Friday for the second consecutive day.
With 3,065 cases reported Friday following 3,140 cases reported Thursday and 2,624 cases reported Wednesday, the six counties of greater Orlando were seeing a coronavirus spread at its worst since the pandemic began last March.
In the latest daily COVID-19 report issued Friday by the Florida Department of Health, Orange County recorded 1,392 new COVID-19 cases, a new one-day worst, toping the 1,390 seen July 16. Orange had 1,307 cases confirmed, now the fourth-highest one day total.
Brevard County saw 410 new cases confirmed Friday, Osceola County, 365, Volusia County, 337, Seminole County 300, and Lake County, 261.
The only other time Central Florida has seen at least 3,000 cases was Thursday. The region now has seen five straight days with more than 2,000 cases, an unprecedented high wave in the outbreak.
Test result rates also ran high — in double digits in all six counties for the fifth consecutive day. Overall, the 21,182 test results that were returned Thursday and reported Friday showed a 12.8% positive rate across Central Florida.
In Lake County, 14.6% of the results returned in Thursday’s batch came back positive. In Orange County, the positive rate was 14.3%; in Seminole, 13.4%; Osceola, 12.4%; Brevard, 10.5%; and Volusia, 10.2%.
Health officials yearn to see those rates below 5%.
State officials reported there were 49 COVID-19 patients newly admitted to hospitals. That included 13 in Orange County, 10 in Lake County, 10 in Volusia County, nine in Seminole County, four in Osceola County, and three in Brevard County.
It marked the fourth consecutive day in which at least 40 people had to be hospitalized with the virus. A week ago, the region was averaging about 24 new hospital admissions per day.
There were seven new deaths attributed to COVID-19 in the region. That was down from 22 the day before. The latest deaths included five people who died in Brevard, and one each in Seminole and Volusia.
