THE VILLAGES, Fla. – For months, many of the residents of one of America’s largest retirement communities went on with their lives as if the coronavirus barely existed. They played bridge. They held dances. They went to parties in golf carts that looked like miniature Jaguars and Rolls-Royces.
And for months they seemed to have avoided the worst of the pandemic. From March through mid-June, there were fewer than 100 cases in Villages, a sprawling community in central Florida where about 120,000 people live, most of them 55 or older.
But now, as cases in Florida increase, the virus appears to have reached townspeople.
Since the beginning of July, hospital admissions for Pueblos residents have quadrupled at the University of Florida Health The Villages, the hospital’s critical care doctors said. Starting last week, the hospital admitted 29 Villages residents, all with the virus, said Dr. Anil Gogineni, a pulmonologist and critical care doctor. That was up in single digits three weeks earlier.
In Sumter County, the largest of the three counties where most towns are concentrated, the number of cases increased from 68 in the first week of June to more than 270 last week, according to the county health department. .
The Villages is a sprawling, palm-fringed community so large it has three zip codes, 12 golf courses, and multiple libraries and cinemas, attracting wealthy retirees from across the country.
Now many residents face their new reality. “It’s leaking, come what may,” said Rob Hannon, 64, as he sipped a beer, adding that “friends who would come for years are saying, ‘We’re not going.'”
The golf course is still crowded, he said, as well as the hair salon where his wife, 53, works. “The women are still going in but they are a little bit more anxious,” Hannon said. “You can’t stop living. But you can stop being arrogant.
In an email sent to residents last week, Jeffrey Lowenkron, the towns’ medical director, said cases were on the rise and urged them to take “proactive steps to reduce the risk of disease transmission.”
“They should consider postponing participation in social events with more than 10 people, particularly those held indoors,” he wrote. “The upward trend is accelerating.”
The fact that the towns initially seemed to escape the worst of the virus had been a source of pride for Governor Ron DeSantis. The governor, a Republican who has strong community support, dismissed concerns about the risks during a visit in April. “There were written articles that said, ‘Oh, the towns are going to crash and burn,'” he said. “They have an infection rate of 2 percent or 2.5 percent.”
But when he returned in early July, the infection rate had risen to 9 percent.
According to the Florida Department of Health, more than a third of the cases in the state, one of the most affected in the nation, have been among people aged 15 to 34, particularly in large cities. There have been serious outbreaks from the start in prisons, nursing homes and farms.
There are now signs that the age of Floridians who contract the virus is changing. Jackson Health System, the Miami-Dade County Public Hospital, said last week that 18 percent of its coronavirus patients were 80 or older. Two weeks earlier, that figure was 9 percent.
About 20 percent of Florida’s population is age 65 and older, the highest percentage in the nation alongside Maine, and that age group has accounted for half of their coronavirus hospitalizations and more than 80 percent of deaths. . As of Saturday, more than 45,000 of the state’s more than 350,000 cases are in that age group.
The increase in cases among older residents is likely due to the spread of the virus by young people who are not taking preventive measures such as wearing masks, said Dr. Madiha Syed, an infectious disease specialist who works at the University of Florida Health.
“You see, they don’t wear their masks,” sighed Dr. Syed. “What do you do?”
But even as cases increase, village doctors say they are prepared for an increase in patients. The hospital has sufficient capacity and antiviral medications, Dr. Gogineni said.
However, one area of concern is the four nursing homes in the community, and several others on the outskirts that also serve residents.
At the beginning of the pandemic, Mr. DeSantis took an aggressive approach in nursing homes, and the state outbreaks were not as deadly as in places like New York. Mr. DeSantis banned nursing home visits, ordered them not to readmit residents unless they had negative results twice, and opened at least 14 coronavirus-only facilities.
That helped curb the spread, but now health officials are concerned that nursing homes cannot avoid an avalanche of cases.
Located outside the village limits and caring for some of its residents, Lady Lake Specialty Care reported 47 cases last week, according to Greystone Healthcare Management.
In the latest effort by the Florida government, the Agency for Health Care Administration last week issued a couple of emergency rules that require every nursing home and assisted living facility in the state to evaluate staff members every two weeks. (The rules do not apply to long-term care facilities.)
Mr. DeSantis said Wednesday that more than 120,000 staff members at nursing homes and assisted living facilities were screened in the past week, of which about 2.8 percent were positive. “We are really happy with that,” he said. Still, he downplayed a recent outbreak at an unidentified long-term care facility in north-central Florida, where 50 staff members tested positive.
Even with the increase, many Villagers residents say they are in conflict with the virus and what to do next.
Some steps have been taken to help curb infections. The crowds around the fake Spanish colonial buildings and fountains are smaller, the theaters are closed, and the bands have stopped playing.
However, residents still congregate every day without wearing masks. They turn up the volume on a radio and dance in the squares. They crowd bars where songs by Elvis Presley and Bobby Sherman play. There are picnic and water aerobics classes.
Jim Lomonaco, 67, a former law enforcement official, ignored the latest headlines.
“I am not pressing my luck, but I am not too worried. If it’s here, it’s already here, we have no walls, ”he said on a recent day. Laughter was heard from other retirees clustered around tables at a nearby restaurant. A few meters away, dozens more were practicing a dance.
Don Phillippi and his partner, Flo Collins, both 79, sat in their golf cart looking at them.
Collins, a retired nurse, said the couple wore masks when shopping for groceries and that they mostly stayed indoors playing card games. “I’m a nurse, so I know that,” she said.
The only time they socialize is when they celebrate a birthday with friends in a restaurant. “But we will have a private room,” Mr. Phillippi insisted. “And we take the temperature and all that sort of thing. To make sure everyone is okay. “
Even if they have had the virus, most Villages residents are reluctant to talk about the virus.
A resident declined to be interviewed because he was embarrassed after getting infected at a party.
“People are being very reserved,” said Neil Craver, 66, who said he contracted the virus two weeks ago. “It is like the plague and they don’t want anyone else to know that they are sick.”
Residents say they have received no instructions on how to tell management if they get sick.
About two-thirds of residents are Republicans, according to local party presidents, and as elsewhere, some political precautions are taken.
“You can tell who is a Democrat, who is a Republican by their masks,” said Chris Stanley, the leader of the Peoples’ Democratic Club.
“It doesn’t make sense to me that there is some kind of magic umbrella that keeps the virus at bay, particularly because people are throwing parties, with houses that have six, five golf cars parked out front,” he said.
Villages resident Amy Rose lost her husband, Chadwick, a laboratory technician at one of Villages’ hospitals, to what she believes to be the coronavirus. Her death, however, was recorded as a heart attack.
She and her husband had coronavirus-like symptoms in January after visiting Disney World when the virus caused little concern in the United States. In April, Mr. Rose, 47, who had a heart condition, suddenly collapsed after exercising.
Mr. Rose’s cardiologist told him that the coronavirus had probably contributed to his heart attack by narrowing the arteries. “They said that because he had that history of a heart attack, they didn’t do the autopsy. They just declared it. “
“His death was very violent,” she said, crying. “It was horrible.”
Mitch Smith contributed reporting.
