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Florida reports record number of COVID-19 hospitalizations
Florida reports record number of COVID-19 hospitalizations
Health
Florida shattered its record for weekly hospitalizations, making it one of the biggest coronavirus hot spots in the nation.
Some 3,355 people were admitted to Florida hospitals from Sunday, Aug. 2, to Monday, the state’s COVID-19 dashboard showed.
Last Wednesday alone, 621 people were admitted to hospitals, The Orlando Sentinel reported. And in total, 30,785 people have been hospitalized in the state with COVID-19 since the start of the pandemic.
“These are devastating numbers,” Dr. Sadiya Khan, an epidemiologist and assistant professor of preventive medicine at Northwestern University's Feinberg School of Medicine, told NBC News.
The blame, Khan said, should be laid at the feet of the Florida leaders who downplayed the danger early on and who have been slow to impose mask mandates and other public health measures.
“In Florida there has been this ongoing controversy about the severity of the coronavirus crisis,” Khan said. “There has been a politicization of the issue of wearing masks. This should never have happened, and now we’re seeing the results.”
Overnight, Florida reported 4,155 new cases and 91 deaths. The total number of cases as of Monday was 532,806, and the statewide death toll was 8,314 and rising, according to the latest NBC News tally.
In terms of the sheer number of COVID-19 cases, Florida was just behind California, which leads the nation with 560,159, the NBC News figures show.
Five states top Florida in the total number of COVID-19 related deaths: New York (33,592), New Jersey (15,872), California (10,351), Texas (8,800) and Massachusetts (8,735).