JACKSONVILLE, Fla. – Florida reported an additional 3,815 cases of COVID-19 in data released Friday by the state health department. That brought the state’s average of daily case increases over the last week to just over 3,200 a day.
Over the last two weeks, Florida averaged about 3,750 new cases a day. That’s down from peaks averaging nearly 12,000 daily in mid-July.
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Overall, the state has now reported 615,806 confirmed cases of COVID-19 since the pandemic began.
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The percent positivity rate has also been lower, remaining below 7% for eight of the last nine days.
As of Thursday, Florida’s daily average in reported deaths over the past week was 118, which is third in the nation behind Texas at 178 and California at 126.
In Friday’s data, Florida reported 88 additional deaths, including two in Duval County and two in Nassau County. That brought Jacksonville’s total to 251 deaths related to COVID-19 since the pandemic began. Nassau County is now at 18 deaths total.
One of the Duval County deaths added Friday was a 48-year-old man; the other was an 83-year-old woman. In Nassau County, the two additional deaths were both men in their 80s.
Florida’s total number of coronavirus-related deaths since the pandemic began is now at 11,099.
The number of people being treated in Florida hospitals for COVID-19 has been declining since a peak of more than 9,500 on July 23. The number of patients in the late morning Thursday stood at 4,285, according to a state hospital census posted online.
The U.S. Department of Labor said Thursday that 45,723 Floridians applied for unemployment benefits last week, a drop from 72,774 new claims filed in the Sunshine State in the previous week.
The jobless claims have been see-sawing over the past several weeks between declines and gains, indicating volatility in the labor market during the pandemic. The Labor Department report said gains in jobless claims two weeks ago were attributed to layoffs in construction, manufacturing trade and service industries.
Common symptoms of COVID-19 include fever, cough, breathing trouble, sore throat, muscle pain, and loss of taste or smell. Most people develop only mild symptoms. But some people, usually those with other medical complications, develop more severe symptoms, including pneumonia.
Deaths from COVID-19 usually occur two weeks or more after diagnosis, so epidemiologists have said Florida’s fatality rate should shrink in the coming weeks if confirmed infections continue to shrink.
The Associated Press contributed to this report.