WEST PALM BEACH, Fla. — Florida's new coronavirus cases rose by 1,823 – the lowest since mid-June and back-to-back days under 2,000 – as deaths increased by 44 – the third-day in a row under triple digits. Also, the positivity rates in the state and Palm Beach County were just under 5 percent as the county spiked nearly 2 percentage points, the Florida Health Department announced Tuesday.
Tuesday's death increased was double Monday's 22, the lowest since Sunday, Aug. 30. For four days the daily difference has dropped – 38 on Sunday after 61 Saturday, 100 Friday and 149 Thursday. Last Tuesday's increase was 144.
Data after a weekend after traditionally lower and Tuesday's information was the day after Labor Day. On the day after Memorial Day, deaths rose by 7 to 2,259 then rose to 60 the next day.
Tuesday's increased cases total was 15 less than Monday's 1,838. Case have been under 2,000 only one other time in three months – 1,885 last Monday and they have been under 3,000 seven times since then. On June 15, cases increased 1,758.
Palm Beach County's death total rose by 2 to 1,170, second highest in the state behind Miami-Dade and ahead of Broward, after 2 deaths were reported Monday.
On the Treasure Coast, no deaths were reported – with St. Lucie at 246, Martin at 120 and Indian River at 104. Okeechobee remained at 20 with its first two deaths on July 25.
Broward increased by 14 and Miami-Dade rose by 8.
Since the first two deaths were announced on March 6, the death toll has climbed to 11,915 and 12,067 including 152 nonresidents, which didn't change.
The state's daily first-time positivity rate of cases remained under 5 percent for three days in a row 4.96 compared with 4.94 then 4.54. It has been under 6 percent for five days in a row with the high 6.67 one week ago when there was a data dump by Quest Diagnostics. Palm Beach County's rate spiked to 4.95 after four days under 4 percent – 3.70, then 3.25, 3.81 and a two-week low of 3.09. The only time over two weeks the rate was not 3 or 4 percent was 5.0 on Aug. 27. On Tuesday, the county moved into Phase Two reopening after the encouraging data.
The daily rate for all tests increased to 6.81 on 40,893 tests reported by the labs to the state Monday compared with 6.35 on 46,391 tests. The two-week high was 10.32 percent with the Quest data dump.
In South Florida, there were 24 of the 44 deaths, 54.5 percent, for a total of 5,556 at 46.6 percent though the population only comprises 30 percent.
Pinellas rose by 5 to 678 deaths in fourth place and Hillsborough went up by 3 to 565 in fifth place. Polk remained at 469 in sixth and Lee rose by 3 to 441.
Florida is in fifth place in the United States. On June 16, Florida was in 11th place in the nation.
Texas is in fourth place with the addition of a U.S.-high 61 deaths Tuesday after a state-record 324 on Aug. 11, for a total of 13,553. California reported 32 new deaths and is in third place overall with 13,758.
Palm Beach County's daily cases increased by 222 after 120 the day before and 100 eight days ago.
Florida's new hospitalizations rose by 112 compared with 59 the day before. The state reported Tuesday there are currently 3,156 hospitalized with a primary diagnosis of COVID-19, which is 4 less than the day before.
Deaths
It took 49 days for the death toll to reach the first 1,000 yet it was only 40 days to more than double.
The last time deaths were more than 200 was 212 on Aug. 18. The state record was 276 on Aug. 11.
State and county increases represent fatalities received by the state Monday and not the number of deaths that occurred then. The day someone dies and when it is received by the state can lag for several days. The most deaths the past month: 147 on Aug. 10.
In a state list of cases and deaths released Tuesday, it reported 1 deaths was removed after further determining a cause of death.
Deaths rose by 541 in the state over seven days (a daily average of 73) for 4.8 percent, a figure tally that had been more than 1,200 deaths recently. Two months ago the one-week figure was in the mid 200s. Palm Beach County rose by 49 for 4.0 percent. The U.S. figure is 2.7 percent with the world at 4.5 percent.
Miami-Dade climbed to 2,666, which is 129 more in one week. Broward increased to 1,234 with a rise of 47 in one week. St. Lucie has risen by 10 deaths in one week compared with Indian River climbing by 6 deaths, Martin by 2 and Okeechobee by 5.
Palm Beach County's death count is higher than 21 states, including Wisconsin at 1,168 after reporting none. Iowa has 1 more than Florida with the addition of 12 more.
The state on Tuesday identified 2 deaths in Palm Beach County: two men (63, 72).
Cases
Since the first two cases were announced on March 1, Florida's total has surged to 3.0 percent of the state's 21.48 million population with 650,092, second in the nation. The average over six months is 3,404 per day.
In one week, cases have risen by 19,052, which average 2,721 per day, at 3.0 percent, a percentage that has been steadily decreasing.
Cases passed 600,000 Aug. 23 and 500,000 on Aug. 5.
California has the most cases in the U.S. at 737,911 with the addition of a U.S.-high 2,676. Texas had 1,416, and is third overall with 641,791. New York, which was the leader during much of the pandemic, is in fourth at 440,578 with 557 more.
Florida's daily case increases have been below 10,000 since July 26 when they climbed by 12,199. Early in the pandemic, cases were under 1,000 with the last one of three digits 966 on June 8.
The cases record was 15,300 was July 5 – the highest daily figure ever in the United States.
In Palm Beach County, new cases have been much lower since the record 1,171 July 5. The total now is 43,309, including residents and nonresidents.
Miami-Dade's cases were 389 compared with 274 and Broward's increase was 130 vs. 133. In the Treasure Coast area, the rise over one day was 25 in St. Lucie, 9 in Martin County, 10 in Indian River and 4 in Okeechobee.
Testing
Florida's total number of people tested is 4,823,952, fourth in the nation, behind No. 1 New York, No. 2 California and No. 3 Texas. That Florida figure is 22.5 percent of Florida's population.
The overall positive rate remained at 143.48.
The daily rate at one time was around 2-3 percent. The two-week high was 11.35 on Aug. 24 and the record is 20.71 percent on July 8.
The record test total was 142,964 July 11.
In Palm Beach County, the last time the first-time rate has been above 10.0 percent was 10.2 percent on Aug. 4.
Miami-Dade's rate was 4.57 percent after a two-week low of 5.02 and a two-week high of 9.55, which included the Quest data dump. The rate hit 26.4 on July 8. Broward's rate was third in a row under 4 percent – 3.91 most recently after a two-week low of 3.08 and 3.34 with the high 5.83 on Aug. 26.
Elsewhere, St. Lucie's rate was 4.79 after 5.92, a two-week low of 4.04 on Wednesday and a high of 6.38 on Aug. 27. Martin's rate spiked to 6.71 after two days under 3 percent, 2.59 then then 2.88, and a two-week high of 12.0 Aug. 27. Indian River's rate was 4.18 percent after 4.31 and four days over two weeks under 2 percent and a high of 5.0 on Aug. 26. Okeechobee's rate was 5.48 on 69 negative tests after 2.86 on 34 negative tests, a high of 11.11 on Aug. 31 on 40 negative tests, including the Quest data dump.
Palm Beach County has 43,309 cases out of 337,552 total tested for 12.83 percent overall, not including those awaiting tests and inconclusive.
Miami-Dade leads with 162,026 positive cases out of 843,697 tested for 19.2 percent, and Broward is second with 73,556 cases and 524,856 tested for 14.01 percentage.
In Martin County, it's 4,560 of 31,980 for 14.26 percent. In St. Lucie, it's 7,366 out of 54,548 for 13.5 percent, Indian River with 2,921 of 32,217 for 9.07 percent and Okeechobee 1,288 of 10,171 for 12.66 percent.
Mortality rate
The mortality rate compares positive cases against deaths.
The state's rate is 1.9 percent for all deaths and cases, including nonresidents, compared with 3.0 percent in the United States and 3.3 percent worldwide, which passed 896,127 deaths and passed 27.4 million cases Tuesday, according to Johns Hopkins.
Palm Beach County's rate was 2.7 percent, compared with Broward at 1.7 percent and Miami-Dade with 1.7 percent. With much fewer deaths, the mortality rate is 3.4 percent in St. Lucie, 2.6 percent in Martin, 3.6 percent in Indian River and 1.6 percent in Okeechobee.
Florida has 555 deaths per 1 million people compared with the U.S. average of 586 per million. New York, which represents 17.4 percent of the deaths in the nation, has 1,701 per million. Worldwide, the figure is 115.5 per million.
Age breakdown
The median age for all deaths in Florida is 79.
Four deaths are among youths 14 and under: a 6-year-old from Hillsborough, a 9-year-year old from Putnam and two 11-year-olds, a boy in Miami-Dade and a girl in Broward. This class did not change.
Four other juveniles are among the 29 deaths in the 15-24 class: a 16-year-old girl in Miami-Dade, a 16-year-old girl in Lee, a 17-year-old boy in Pasco and a 17-year-old boy in Manatee. This class did not change.
Eighty-two people from 25 to 34 also have died from the virus with no change.
A total of 3,864 people 85 and older have died in the state from the virus, an increase of 10 in one day.
Ninety-three percent of the fatalities are 55 and older and 61 percent are 75 and older. A smaller percentage of older people have tested positive – 28 percent age 55 and older and 7 percent 75 and older.
At the other end of the age spectrum, there are 10,991 cases of infants to 4 years old, an increase of 30, and 252 were hospitalized, which went up by 2 From ages 5-14, there are 26,809 an increase of 97 with 226 in the hospital at one time, which didn't change.
From the infant to 54 age group, 562,533 of the 642,775 residents' cases. In that group, 820 have died, with an increase of 5, for a 0.18 death percentage. From infant to 64, there are 546,529 cases. A total of 2,102 have died, an increase of 13, for a 0.38 percentage.
Cities
West Palm Beach is in first place among Palm Beach County cities with 10,780, with an increase of 28. Lake Worth, which includes the city and county portion, rose 23 to 7,521 followed by Boca Raton at 6,037, up from 6,015, Boynton Beach at 3,843 from 3,830 and Delray Beach at 2,974 vs. 2,964. A total of 965 in the county not designated by a city.
Port St. Lucie leads the Treasure Coast with 4,309, an increase of 10 followed by Fort Pierce at 2,641, up 5, and Stuart with 2,131, which was an increase of 3.
In Indian River County, Fellsmere, which has a population of 5,754, remained at 397 compared with only 3 on May 31.
Hospitalizations
A total of 40,195 people in the state have been hospitalized, a rise from 38,859 seven days ago. That means it is a running total and includes people who have been released or died.
The number is 3,429 in Palm Beach County, a rise of 5 compared with 2 the day before; 382 in Martin, which didn't change; 546 in St. Lucie with an increases of 17, Indian River went up by 5 to 272 and Okeechobee went from 140 to 143.
Long-term care
Forty-two percent of the deaths, 4,973, are residents and staff of long-term care, including 505 in Palm Beach County, which is second most in the state behind 732 in Miami-Dade. The state increase was 19 and in Palm Beach County it didn't change.
National
Since the first death was reported six months ago on Feb. 29, the toll has risen to 189,639, a gain of 431, according to Johns Hopkins.
Cases reached 6,325,586 with an increase of 24,964. They have exceeded 70,000 seven times, including a record 78,446 on July 24 and the last time was July 31.
Last Tuesday in the U.S., there were 1,067 more deaths and 43,253 cases.
The one week U.S. death increase was 4,975 at 2.7 percent.
New York has the most deaths in the nation at 33,016 with 14 reported Tuesday, after a high of 799 in April.
Among other states in the top 10 for deaths: No. 2 New Jersey 5, No. 6 Massachusetts 8, No. 7 Illinois 7, No. 8 Pennsylvania `4, No. 9 Michigan 1, No. 10 Georgia 26.
Also, No. 11 Arizona reported 2 deaths, as well as an additional 81 cases. No. 23 Washington, the original epicenter in the United States, reported no deaths.
Worldwide
The U.S. represented 12.4 percent of the 3,481 additional deaths Tuesday and 21.2 percent of the world total though its population is only 4.3 percent of the global total. The one week world death increase was 40,436 at 4.5 percent.
Last Tuesday's death increase was 6,480.
Cases increased by 205,405 after a record 304,626 on Friday.
Brazil, which is second behind the United States for deaths, reported 516 deaths to rise to 127,517. Brazil's record is 1,554 on July 29. The nation added 17,330 cases at 4,165,124 in third place.
India reported a record and world high 1,133 additional deaths to rise to 72,775 and in third place. India added 75,809 cases, the lowest in a week, to rise to 42,046,613 in second behind the U.S.
Mexico announced 703 more deaths late Tuesday compared with a high of 1,092 on June 4 for a total of 68,484 in fourth place.
Four European nations are in the top 10. The United Kingdom reported 32 additional deaths for 41,586 in fifth place with the record daily high 1,172. No. 6 Italy, which at one time was the world's epicenter and reached 919 in one day, reported 10 deaths. No. 7 France had 38 deaths and No. 9 Spain 78, as well as 8,964 cases.
No. 8 Peru gained 147 deaths and No. 10 Iran had 132 Tuesday.
Russia is in fourth place in the world in cases with 1,035,789, including an additional 5,099. The nation gained 122 deaths and is in 12th.
No. 19 Canada reported 7 deaths to rise to 9,153 and 1,606 cases.
Sweden, which has been doing "herd immunity," reported 4 deaths and has 5,838 total. Neighboring Norway announced zero deaths for the 19th day in a row to remain at 264 deaths, as well as 102 more cases.
No. 28 China, the original epicenter of the world, hasn’t reported a death since April 26, and added `2 cases Wednesday.
Japan reported 14 deaths for a total of 1,377 Tuesday.