Florida coronavirus: State reports 2,610 new cases, 25 deaths in latest update

TAMPA (WFLA) — The Florida Department of Health reported the second-largest spike of cases with just over 2,600 new cases Wednesday.

The numbers released by state health officials Wednesday morning show a 2,610 case increase, bringing the total positive cases 82,719. The death count increased by 25, bringing the death toll to 3,018.

Hospitalizations reached 12,389 on Wednesday. That’s 183 more hospitalizations than were reported the previous day.

Florida has seen an increase of over 1,000 COVID-19 cases in 14 of the last 15 days. The first 2,000-plus case count was Saturday and was the highest spike the state had seen until Tuesday.

Despite that spike, Gov. Ron DeSantis says the state will not be shutting down again. He says the recent increase can be attributed to increased testing.

The state’s cumulative percent positive stands at 5.6%. A total of 1,486,759 people have been tested. Of those tests, 82,719 have been positive.

The percent positivity for new cases – the number of people who tested positive for the first time divided by all the people tested that day – was 10.30% on Tuesday. The total percent positive of all tests – including people who have been tested on multiple days – was 12.52%. State officials say a total of 22,073 people tested negative while 3,160 tests came back positive.

The United States has eclipsed 2 million cases of the virus, with over 117,000 deaths. In total, the world has seen over 8 million cases, with over 444,000 deaths.

Here is a county-by-county breakdown of cases across Tampa Bay: