JACKSONVILLE, Fla. – As the number of death from COVID-19 surpassed 700 on Friday and the state saw its highest one-day increase in cases, a prominent forecast model has dramatically dropped the number of coronavirus fatalities it projects for the state.
Florida has 24,753 confirmed cases of COVID-19, 726 deaths and 3,649 people hospitalized with complications of the virus, according to the data released by the Florida Department of Health on Friday evening.
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The number of confirmed cases grew 1,413 on Friday, the highest number of new cases since the outbreak began more than a month ago. The state’s Department of Health also reported 58 new deaths since Thursday evening. Four of those deaths were in Northeast Florida.
Also Friday, the Institute for Health Metrics and Evaluation at the University of Washington revised its coronavirus model for Florida significantly, forecasting that the state saw its peak of deaths two weeks ago will see 1,363 deaths from COVID-19 by Aug. 4, far lower than the 4,748 projected earlier this week.
South Florida is the state’s hotbed for the virus. The 14,668 cases and 420 deaths across South Florida’s four counties represent nearly 60% of the state’s totals.
Northeast Florida has seen 1,663 coronavirus cases, resulting in 36 deaths.
The health department says that over 241,000 coronavirus tests have been administered across Florida, with 10.3 percent of those coming back positive.
The IHME model says that Florida has not only passed its peak deaths per day and peak hospital resource use, which had previously been projected to happen in early May. It showed the most deaths per day in the state were 77 on April 2 even though FDOH data showed only 34 people died that day and the number of deaths in Florida has surpassed that number at least seven days since then.
The United States is predicted to reach 60,308 deaths by Aug. 4 in the IHME projection model, lower than the prediction of 68,841 from Monday.
The U.S. number of cases in the United States surpassed 700,000 cases Friday night, the largest number in the world, with more than 37,000 deaths. Over 58,000 Americans have been classified as recovered, according to data compiled from various sources by Johns Hopkins University. There are no data on people recovered in Florida although News4Jax has interviewed several people who were diagnosed with COVID-19 who are now better.
Worldwide, the number of COVID-19 cases is over 2.2 million, and there have been more than 153,000 deaths from the disease. Over 565,000 people globally have been classified as recovered.