Polk County has a record-breaking 116 new COVID-19 cases reported on Friday morning, bringing its total closer to breaking 2,000.
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LAKELAND — Polk County saw a dramatic spike of 116 new COVID-19 cases reported on Friday morning, shattering its prior daily record set Tuesday.
This brings Polk’s total to 1,856 cases of the novel coronavirus, with more than one-third of the county’s cases in Lakeland. The second largest concentration is in Winter Haven which had 364 cases as of Friday morning.
Polk’s increasing case numbers align with alarming trend as 3,822 new COVID-19 cases were reported in Florida since Thursday, according to the state health department’s daily report released on Friday morning. This sets a record for daily new cases in the state.
The county surged to a 14.9% positive rate for 655 tests results reported since Thursday morning. This is one of the highest positive daily rates reported for Polk — falling short of Tuesday’s 15.4% positive rate — but pushing the county’s cumulative average to 5%, gradually closer to the statewide average of 6%. Health care officials have warned that positive testing rates should stay below 10% if COVID-19 is to be contained.
The county’s new high positive rate does not appear related to a significant jump in the number of tests administered. The number of daily tests reported has ranged from 400 to about 1,300 during a two-week period starting June 5.
With the influx of new cases, the median age of those newly infected in Polk County has continued its downward trend dropping from 50 to 35 years old. New cases reported on Friday range in age from a 9-year-old boy to a 78-year-old woman, with the clusters of individuals in their mid-20s to early 40s.
The number of individuals who have been hospitalized for treatment increased by eight overnight, bringing the total to 401. This represents 22% of all COVID-19 cases and remains significantly higher than the 15% statewide hospitalization rate.
In Polk County, hospitals reported that 17.9% of all hospital beds remained available at 11:30 a.m. Friday. Only 37 of 159 adult ICU beds were vacant, according to the state’s Agency for Health Care Administration dashboard, though local hospitals have said these figures don’t include their surge capacity.
One new coronavirus-related death was reported in Polk for a 73-year-old male who died May 27. This raises the county’s total to 77 deaths, with at least 56 connected to long-term care facilities.
The rate of infections has continued to rise dramatically in Polk County over the past two weeks, since Gov. Ron DeSantis approved moving forward with Phase 2 reopening on June 5. Friday is the first day that a triple-digit number of new cases was reported.
Lakeland officials and the Polk County Department of Health have continued to urge residents via social media to wear masks when in public and unable to social distance to prevent the spread of the coronavirus.
Sara-Megan Walsh can be reached at swalsh@theledger.com or 863-802-7545.
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