Florida surpasses 200K coronavirus cases as state reports 10K+ new positives

TAMPA, Fla. (WFLA) – Florida reported more than 10,000 new cases of coronavirus on Sunday, pushing the state over the 200,000-case threshold.

The state reported ‭10,059‬ new cases on Sunday morning, bringing the total number of cases in Florida to 200,111.

The health department reported 160 new hospitalizations and 29 new deaths. There have been 3,731 total deaths in Florida residents and 101 non-resident deaths. A total of 15,895 Floridians have been hospitalized since the beginning of the pandemic.

The percent positivity for new cases – the number of people who tested positive for the first time divided by all the people tested that day – was 15.04% on Saturday.

The total percent positive of all tests – including people who have been tested on multiple days – was 17.02%. The state says 58,080 negative test results were received while 11,913 people tested positive.

The state says it received 69,993 test results on Saturday. That does not mean that’s how many people were tested Saturday, just how many lab results were received by the state.

“We’ve not only got more expansive testing, again that’s definitely part of it, but we’ve absolutely got community spread,” University of South Florida Associate Professor of Epidemiology Dr. Jason Salemi told 8 On Your Side’s Justin Schecker.

According to Dr. Salemi, the curves for every single age group are going up when it comes to coronavirus cases. The median age of cases on Sunday was 36.

According to Sunday’s report, people in the 25 to 34 age group account for the largest percentage of coronavirus cases throughout the state. There have been 40,970 people in that age group who have tested positive – about 21% of the state’s total cases.

The chief of infectious diseases at Moffitt told us last month when coronavirus cases in Florida started spiking that ICU capacity was a concern for hospitals.

“I would say hospitals and all of their administrators are very concerned, they communicate with each other, and everybody is seeing the same increase in filling up their hospitals with coronavirus patients,” Dr. John Greene told 8 On Your Side’s Mahsa Saeidi on June 24.

Florida’s Agency for Health Care Administration reported Sunday morning that four hospitals in Pinellas County had run out of ICU beds.

But Baycare Health Chief Medical Officer Dr. Nishant Anand appeared on CNN this weekend and pointed out a positive: He says there are more recoveries now because doctors have a better grasp of how to treat the infected compared to earlier in the pandemic.

Here is the county-by-county breakdown across Tampa Bay as of Sunday: