Florida reported 12,523 new cases of coronavirus on Saturday, marking the fifth consecutive day that the hotspot state reported more than 10,000 cases, according to the state health department.
The state has reported more than 11,865 coronavirus cases on average in the past seven days, up 28.85% compared to a week ago, according to a CNBC analysis of data compiled by Johns Hopkins University. The Florida Department of Health says the virus has infected more than 350,047 people in the state and has killed at least 4,982 people.
The state has reported more than 10,000 new cases per day since Tuesday. Of the past ten days, Florida has reported more than 10,000 new cases per day on nine of those days, according to the state health department. It reported a record increase of 15,244 new cases on July 11.
Hospitalizations have also increased in recent weeks. As of Sunday, 49 hospitals had no more adult intensive care units available, according to the Florida Health Care Administration Agency.
“The residents here are terrified and I am terrified, for the first time in my career because there is a lack of leadership,” said Florida Rep. Donna Shalala, a Democrat whose district is within Miami-Dade County on ABC. “This Week “. ” “It’s terrible. We have community spread, which means the virus is out of control. “
Lack of federal and state leadership by Gov. Ron DeSantis, a Republican, has hampered local officials’ ability to control the virus, Shalala said. He added that the state did not close long enough to “starve the virus” and that the governor refused to issue a mask order across the state.
“In my district, it’s the low-income minorities: Hispanic and African-American,” he said, “who are forced to return to work for economic reasons and because their employers demanded that they return to work.”
He added that people in his district live in multi-generational homes, so those who become infected often pass it on to older relatives.
In the past seven days, the average age of newly infected people in Florida was over 40, according to the state health department. That marks a steady increase since mid-June, when Governor Ron DeSantis noted that the average age of those who tested positive had dropped from 65.5 years in March to 37 in June, reaching a low of 33 on June 24.
DeSantis has cited the younger age of patients as evidence that the state is effectively protecting its most vulnerable residents. Younger people are less likely to become seriously ill and die from Covid-19, according to data from the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention. But as more and more young people have contracted the virus, they appear to have transmitted it to a larger and more vulnerable population.
“There is more evidence now than before, so that may explain some of this, but I think we are seeing a real increase in cases in older adults, which makes sense given the large overall increase in cases,” Cindy Prins, a Epidemiologist at the University of Florida, told CNBC last week.
Shalala added that Covid-19 hospitalizations have been increasing steadily, especially in her southern Florida district. She said some hospitals are overwhelmed and that patients need to worry about receiving quality care in the current environment if they get sick and need to be hospitalized.
Republican Senator Marco Rubio said earlier this week that the shortage of remdesivir, the only drug currently authorized in the US to treat Covid-19, which is reported in Florida hospitals is due to a “bad disconnect” with the Trump administration about the needs of their state. The Department of Health and Human Services signed an agreement with drug maker Gilead to ensure the available supply of the drug, but amid the recent surge in cases, hospitals have been struggling to meet demand.
“We need to close in Florida,” Shalala said. “Our economy will not return until we find this virus in the lead and take it down.”
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