MIAMI — Florida's Department of Health on Monday confirmed 3,924 additional cases of COVID-19, bringing the state's known total to 847,821. Also, 58 resident deaths were announced, bringing the resident death toll to 17,179.
On Sunday, the cumulative nonresident toll was at 212. There were no nonresident deaths announced Monday, keeping the nonresident toll to 212.
Fewer tests are usually processed during the weekend and sometimes also cause Monday to see a smaller case count.
And this Monday's single-day case count is the lowest reported since Oct. 31 when there were 2,331 cases, breaking an eight-day trend of Florida reporting cases higher than 4,000.
State-supported COVID-19 testing sites in Miami-Dade and Broward counties were closed this weekend for Tropical Storm Eta preparations. The sites will remain closed at least until Tuesday. COVID-19 test sites in Palm Beach County, which also closed during the weekend, will reopen Wednesday and test sites in Lee County are also closed until further notice.
One of the tools that officials rely on to determine whether the coronavirus situation is improving in the state is hospitalization data. Unlike testing, which might be limited or take days to report results, hospitalizations can help give officials a real-time snapshot of how many people are severely ill with COVID-19.
The Florida Agency for Health Care Administration reports the number of patients hospitalized statewide with a "primary diagnosis of COVID." The data, which is updated at least every hour, does not distinguish between the number of COVID-19 patients in hospital intensive care units and those in acute-care beds, which require less attention from nurses.
Previously, the state was providing only the total number of hospitalizations in its statewide and county-level data. Miami-Dade was an exception, with hospitals self-reporting a number of key metrics, including hospitalizations, to the county, which has made this data public for several months.
As of 2:30 p.m. EST Monday, there were 2,897 COVID-19 patients admitted into hospitals throughout the state, according to the Florida Agency for Health Care Administration dashboard. This is a significant decrease from early August, when more than 5,000 COVID-19 patients were admitted into hospitals throughout the state.
The state has had a total of 50,591 Florida residents hospitalized for COVID-19-related complications, according to Florida's COVID-19 Data and Surveillance Dashboard.
Testing in Florida has seen steady growth since the COVID-19 crisis began.
Testing, like hospitalizations, helps officials determine the virus's progress and plays a role in deciding whether it is safe to lift stay-at-home orders and loosen restrictions.
Epidemiologists then use the testing data to create a positivity rate. The rate helps them determine if a rise in cases is because of an increase in testing or if it means there's increased transmission of the virus in the community.
On Monday, Florida's Department of Health reported the results of 52,427 people tested on Sunday. The positivity rate of new cases (people who tested positive for the first time) increased from 6.24% to 8.07%.
If retests are included — people who have tested positive once and are being tested for a second time — the positivity rate increased from 7.67% to 10%, according to the report.
