Deaths in Florida due to COVID-19 have passed 2,000.
Statewide, 2,052 people have died; an increase of 55 over Monday.
According to information released Tuesday by the Florida Department of Health, 19 of the deaths were in the Tampa Bay area. It’s the second-largest daily increase in deaths since the coronavirus outbreak began. The largest number is 21, which was recorded on April 28.
Health officials report 46,944 people have tested positive for the coronavirus in Florida. That's an increase of 502 since Monday.
There were 91 new infections reported in the Tampa Bay area over that same time.
The daily Florida Department of Health report includes information released by the state on an individual day. Cases and deaths in the report may have happened days or weeks earlier, according to state officials.
On Monday, Governor Ron DeSantis spoke out after test results showed a spike in cases in Miami-Dade County.
DeSantis cautioned the reporting does not necessarily mean the virus is spreading more, saying, "Of the 500 cases reported yesterday from Miami, 400 of them were backlogged cases from three weeks ago,” DeSantis explained. “There is this test center not affiliated with the state who had been running tests, and they just now reported it.”
The governor pointed out that the state publishes test results on the day they are retrieved rather than on the day the tests were conducted.
“It’s usually a data dump with backlogged tests, a prison outbreak, nursing home,” DeSantis said, “Or sometimes we’ll have new test sites that pop up and you see a surge and then it dies down.”
DeSantis warned that anyone looking at Florida’s curve should expect to see some statistical anomalies. He also said, overall, signs that the spread of COVID-19 in Florida is slowing down are positive.
The Department of Health provided some information on the 19 deaths in the Tampa Bay region:
- In Hillsborough County – Four women; ages 71, 80, 88 and 90, and a 90-year old man.
- In Manatee County – An 80-year-old man.
- In Pasco County – Two women; ages 73 and 74, and a 73-year-old man.
- In Pinellas County – Two men; ages 75 and 82, and an 81-year-old woman.
- In Polk County – Two women; ages 84 and 89.
- In Sarasota County – Three men; ages 75, 84 and 86, and two women; ages 75 and 80.
Tampa Bay area positive tests as of 10 a.m. Tuesday, May 19:
- Hillsborough: 1,670 (1,613 local, 57 non-resident)
- Pinellas: 1,062 (1,018 local, 44 non-resident)
- Manatee: 888 (883 local, 5 non-resident)
- Polk: 766 (756 local, 10 non-resident)
- Sarasota: 533 (517 local, 16 non-Sarasota resident)
- Pasco: 327 (317 local, 10 non-Pasco resident)
- Hernando: 109 (102 local, 7 non-Hernando resident)
Florida COVID-19 daily total of positive tests/deaths for the last two weeks:
- May 19: 502 / 55
- May 18: 854 / 24
- May 17: 777 / 9
- May 16: 673 / 48
- May 15: 928 / 42
- May 14: 808 / 48
- May 13: 479 / 48
- May 12: 941 / 44
- May 11: 386 / 14
- May 10: 595 / 6
- May 9: 802 / 46
- May 8: 371 / 69
- May 7: 826 / 61
- May 6: 563 / 68
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