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Current as of August 7, 2020, at 7:27 a.m.
COVID-19 Testing Sites in Florida
  • Drive-Thru Testing sites available are listed by county. Each walk up site can test up to 200 individuals per day. Access the list here.

Safe. Smart. Step-by-Step.

The Florida Department of Economic Opportunity is giving daily updates on Florida’s Reemployment Assistance program: View DEO Dashboard Here.

Florida Department of Health COVID Dashboard: Access dashboard here.

Graphs, Charts, and Real-time Tracking of COVID-19

Data Sources

Data Sources on Social Media

Other Resources


Current Statistics

  • Fatality rate in Florida - 1.5%
  • Covid fatality rate in FL by age group:
  • 15-24 years old - .03%
  • 25-34 years old - .06%
  • 35-44 years old - .20%
  • 45-54 years old - .41%
  • 55-64 years old - 1.2%
  • 65-74 years old - 4.2%
  • 75 and up - 14%
  • Seasonal influenza mortality rate in the US (2017 CDC) 18-49 yo - .02%

  • Median age of new Covid cases - 40 years old
  • Emergency department visits w/ COVID-like illness - 37% decrease
  • ICU beds available in Florida - 17%
  • Hospital beds available in Florida - 23%

Vaccine Tracking

Last updated: August 6, 2020 9:15 PM PST

202
vaccines are in development.

24
are now in clinical testing.

The summer surge in COVID-19 infections reported by several Sunbelt states, which has driven a nationwide rise in cases and deaths, seems to be subsiding. Recent data indicate that daily new cases, after rising dramatically in June and July, are either declining or leveling off in Arizona, California, Florida, Georgia, and Texas.

According to Worldometer's tallies, which are based on numbers from state and local health departments, the seven-day average of newly reported infections in Arizona fell from a peak of nearly 3,700 on July 7 to less than 2,000 yesterday.

Three other Sunbelt states also have seen substantial declines in their seven-day averages: from about 10,300 on July 25 to about 6,700 on August 5 in California*; from about 11,900 on July 17 to about 7,300 on August 5 in Florida; and from about 10,100 on July 15 to about 8,300 on August 5 in Texas. In Georgia, meanwhile, the seven-day average peaked around 3,700 on July 24 and has since fallen slightly to about 3,300 as of yesterday.

Consistent with those trends, independent data scientist Youyang Gu's model shows the COVID-19 reproductive number—the number of people infected by the average carrier—falling below one in Arizona, California, Florida, Georgia, and Texas. A reproductive number of less than one indicates a waning epidemic.

Lockdown supporters might surmise that increased government restrictions on social and economic activity explain these positive trends. Florida and Texas, for example, ordered bars to close on June 26 after allowing them to reopen on June 3 and May 22, respectively. Texas Gov. Gregg Abbott also reduced the number of customers restaurants are allowed to serve from 75 percent to 50 percent of capacity. In California, Gov. Gavin Newsom closed bars, zoos, and museums on July 13, when he also banned indoor dining in restaurants.

It is certainly plausible that limiting the options for people to get together, especially indoors in close quarters, would reduce virus transmission. But it is difficult to disentangle the impact of government mandates from the impact of increased voluntary precautions, both of which can be expected in response to spikes in cases.

According to the current "best estimate" from the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC), about 40 percent of people infected by the COVID-19 virus do not develop symptoms. But among those who do, the CDC says, symptoms generally appear after about five days, although the lag can be as short as two days or as long as 14. Keeping in mind the typical delay between infection and symptoms that might motivate people to seek testing, the downward trends in California, Florida, and Texas, which began two to three weeks after the new rules were imposed, do not fit very well with the hypothesis that government restrictions are driving the decreases. And neither Arizona, where the seven-day average of daily new cases fell by 46 percent from July 7 to August 5, nor Georgia, where cases have declined slightly since late July, imposed new restrictions in response to rising infections.

What about face masks? Newsom imposed a statewide mandate in California on June 18, followed by Abbott in Texas on July 2. But Arizona, Florida, and Georgia have no such rules, although some local governments in those states require face masks in public places. And here, too, it is hard to tell how much impact government policy has, independent of voluntary steps taken by businesses and individuals.

If Californians and Texans are more inclined to wear masks now than they were in June and early July, is that because more businesses are requiring them, because the surge in cases made people more cautious, or because the governor made face coverings mandatory? The timing of the downward trends in California and Texas, which began more than a month after Newsom's mask mandate and two weeks after Abbott's, casts doubt on those orders' effectiveness.

The seven-day average of COVID-19 fatalities has continued to rise in all of these states, as you would expect based on the typical lag between laboratory confirmation and death—about two weeks, per the CDC. But by the same token, the recent declines in newly identified cases should mean fewer deaths in the coming weeks than we otherwise would have seen, which is (relatively) good news. Gu's projections show daily deaths declining in all five states during the next few months.

Daily new cases are also falling nationally, from a seven-day average of about 69,200 on July 25 to less than 60,000 on August 4, while the seven-day average of daily deaths may be leveling off. Gu, who has a good track record of predicting COVID-19 fatalities, is projecting that daily deaths in the United States will decline gradually during the next few months, from about 1,400 on August 4 to about 530 on November 1. He projects a total U.S. death toll of about 227,000 by then, up from about 157,000 yesterday.

*Update: A technical glitch may have made the decline in California's cases look larger than it actually is. The Sacramento Bee reports that the error, which probably began affecting case totals "around last Friday," led to "significant" undercounting, although exactly how significant is unclear. Citing California Health and Human Services Secretary Mark Ghaly, the Bee says "the one- and two-week figures are affected by the recent technical issue to an extent but remain more accurate depictions of COVID-19 activity than single-day totals."


For most Americans the coronavirus is a scourge. But teachers unions seem to think it’s also an opportunity—to squeeze more money from taxpayers and put their private and public charter school competition out of business. That’s the only way to read the extraordinary effort by national and local union leaders to keep their members from returning to the classroom.

Last week Randi Weingarten, leader of the powerful American Federation of Teachers, declared support for “safety strikes” if local unions deem insufficient the steps their school districts are taking to mitigate Covid-19. And on Monday an alliance of teachers unions and progressive groups sponsored what they called a “national day of resistance” around the country listing their demands before returning to the classroom.

They include:

“• Support for our communities and families, including canceling rents and mortgages, a moratorium on evictions/foreclosures, providing direct cash assistance to those not able to work or who are unemployed, and other critical social needs

• Moratorium on new charter or voucher programs and standardized testing

• Massive infusion of federal money to support the reopening funded by taxing billionaires and Wall Street”

The phrase for this is political extortion. Rather than work to open schools safely, the unions are issuing ultimatums and threatening strikes until they are granted their ideological wish list. Children, who would have to endure more lost instruction, are their hostages.

These public unions are also lobbying their political allies to keep public charter and private schools closed. On Friday the chief health officer for Maryland’s Montgomery County, Travis Gayles, ordered private schools to remain closed until Oct. 1.

The order came in spite of the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention saying that reopening schools with in-person instruction is a step toward improving public health—especially for low-income and minority children. The order was a slap to the many schools that are moving heaven and earth to reopen within the CDC guidelines.

The good news is that Maryland Gov. Larry Hogan on Monday overruled the commissioner. In an amended emergency order, he limited the ability of local health officials to impose “blanket closure” mandates, emphasizing that Maryland’s plan is built on local flexibility. He also took a stand for equal opportunity: “Private and parochial schools deserve the same opportunity and flexibility to make reopening decisions based on public health guidelines.” This is a victory for common sense, but it’s also too rare.

New Jersey Gov. Phil Murphy has said that if public schools are remote-only, private schools must be too. In Milwaukee, private schools planning to reopen were blindsided by a state order that no schools can do so until the city meets certain benchmarks. In California, Gov. Gavin Newsom has laid out new guidelines that will prevent private and public schools from reopening until the state declares they can.

“It’s truly a tale of two worlds,” says the Center for Education Reform’s Jeanne Allen. “On the one hand the teachers unions are rallying their members in places like Massachusetts and Chicago to boycott school openings until their demands are met. On the other hand, there are hundreds of schools that each day are announcing their plans to reopen and the steps they are taking to get their kids learning again.”
Public schools are funded whether they open or not. But private and religious schools, which rely on tuition and donations, don’t have that luxury. The Cato Institute’s Center for Educational Freedom reckons that 107 private and religious schools have been shut down permanently at least partly due to Covid-19. New York’s Catholic archdiocese has announced the closure of 20 schools.

The teachers unions have a cynical interest in forcing their competitors to shut down. What a humiliation it would be if charter and private schools reopen and demonstrate that in-person education can be done with the right risk mitigation. Or if parents unsatisfied with the public schools’ response to the coronavirus decide a private school would be better for their child.

If there’s a silver lining here, it’s that Americans are getting a closer look at the true, self-interested character of today’s teachers unions. They are allies of the political left. And they wield monopoly power that they are now using to coerce parents and taxpayers to dance to their agenda if they want their children to learn.

The proper political response should be to give taxpayer dollars to parents to decide where and how to educate their children. If parents want to use the money for private schools that are open, or for new forms of home instruction, they should have that right. No political force should have veto power over the education of America’s children.

The U.S. Treasury Department said on Wednesday it plans to continue a shift to longer-term notes and bonds as it issues debt in coming quarters to fund measures to offset the impact of the COVID-19 epidemic.

The Treasury expects its borrowing needs to moderate but remain elevated according to a statement by Brian Smith, its deputy assistant secretary for federal finance, depending partly on what additional legislation is put in place.

The federal agency will use “long-term issuance as a prudent means of managing its maturity profile and limiting potential future issuance volatility,” Smith said.

As Treasury increases auction sizes, it will have larger increases in 7-year, 10-year, 20-year and 30-year notes and bonds, he said.

Treasury has been raising extra money to fund trillions of dollars in coronavirus-related economic aid allocated by Washington. As of Tuesday, White House negotiators were trying to reach a deal with congressional Democrats to extend relief measures including unemployment benefits, liability protections for businesses and a moratorium on evictions.

The Treasury on Monday had already said it plans to borrow $947 billion in the third quarter, about $270 billion more than it previously estimated for the July-September period, and Smith reiterated the $947 billion figure on Wednesday. Borrowing has spiked far above the quarterly record set during the 2008 financial crisis.

A declining economic outlook has driven down U.S Treasury yields across the curve to record or near-record lows, helping raise equity prices and lower borrowing costs.


As Congress haggles over stimulus to help the nation’s unemployed, markets await July’s employment data, which is expected to show how much impact there was on the economy from rising infection rates and renewed virus-related shutdowns across the Sun Belt.

Economists forecast 1.48 million jobs were gained in July, down sharply from the 4.8 million in June, according to Dow Jones. But the range of estimates is wide, and some economists with higher forecasts for job growth expect the negative impact of the spreading virus to possibly show up in August’s figures instead.
“The question is whether the interpretation of the numbers will assuage concerns that the economy is slowing,” said Quincy Krosby, chief market strategist at Prudential Financial. Thursday’s unemployment claims, showing a smaller than expected 1.2 million new claims, helped calm some of those fears about a slower recovery. There were 16.1 million continuing claims last week, down 844,000.

“A number that can again allow for that to be less of a concern is going to help the markets, as well as any sense going into tomorrow that the Republicans and Democrats can carve out a deal,” she said. Congressional leaders were set to meet Thursday evening to discuss the latest stimulus package, which both sides expect to be completed.

However, the respective dollar amounts of the next package continued to be far apart Thursday. The Republican-controlled Senate has proposed $1 trillion in new spending, while Democrats initially proposed a $3 trillion bill.

As for the July payrolls, economists expect a number ranging from flat or even negative to gains of more than 3 million. 

Citigroup economists are forecasting one of the highest numbers of new jobs, at 3 million and an unemployment rate falling to 10.1% from 11.1%.

“This would reflect that many businesses likely continued to reopen and rehire employees in late-June and early-July,” Citi economists wrote. They noted the markets are keenly focused on employment as one of the best measures of the economy’s progress.

“We would expect a larger market reaction in the event of weaker, or even negative, job growth in July, as it would call into question the so far strong rebound story,” noted the Citi economists. But they also said there is more potential for the markets to have either a positive or negative reaction, compared to the last few months where the risks leaned to the upside.

“July likely marks a shift to monthly employment reports becoming more indicative of the pace of the economic recovery later this year, as opposed to more-mechanical rehiring upon reopenings,” they noted.

The downside case

Tom Simons, Jefferies money market economist, is at the other end of the spectrum. Jefferies has a forecast of zero job growth, including the loss of 750,000 public sector workers.

“State and local government budgets are kind of a mess right now,” Simons said. “There are a lot of signs net hiring is not very much.” Jefferies pointed to a recent Cornell study that showed 31% of rehired workers said they were laid off again.

“The economy was opening. The jobs market was healing, and then it looked like it was beginning to stall,” Krosby said. She added that there are signs of peaking cases in some states, which would be positive for the market.

Ian Lyngen, head of fixed income strategy at BMO, said one reason for a wide range of estimates is that usually reliable unemployment claims data and the monthly jobs reports have not been well correlated during the pandemic.

“The question that the market is looking to for the data to answer is whether or not the increases in Covid-19 cases are going to hurt employment. The chances are if it doesn’t show up in this number, it shows up in August,” he said.

Lyngen said it would not be surprising to see the jobs report miss the market’s expectations.
“The stimulus then subsequently takes on a heightened relevance for market participants if we get a weak nonfarm payrolls. If the zero [forecast] wins, the lawmakers better deliver,” he said.

Strategists have said one factor helping drive Treasury yields to record lows is concern the economy’s rebound is shallower than expected, and Congress will not provide a big enough boost to help it. 
The stimulus package is expected to address the enhanced unemployment payment of $600 a week that expired last weekend for millions of unemployed Americans. Some economists say if there is no extension of that extra payment, it would result in a slowdown in consumer spending which could further damage the economy.

Krosby she expects there could be a compromise payment, reducing it to about $400 a week, plus another lump sum payout of $1,200. Krosby said she is now hearing from Washington policy experts that the potential bill could reach $1.7 trillion from an earlier estimate of $1.5 trillion or less.

The phrase, “the doctor will see you now” has taken on a whole new meaning during the Coronavirus pandemic. Millions of Americans who were receiving care during an office visit are suddenly doing so through video conferences, text messages, and apps.

Nearly 200 physicians—including over 60 past presidents of major medical societies, and representation from 100% of the top 20 Hospitals identified by US News and World Report—sent a letter to Congressional leadership earlier this week to emphasize a tremendous opportunity to improve our health care system. An opportunity grounded in expanding digital health and “leveraging the latest medical knowledge with the advancing power of technology.”  

If America is to avoid a another ‘COVID-19’ type of crisis in our future, policymakers must adopt two policy reforms that will immediately expand our ability to deliver better health care to more people at a lower cost:

  • A permanent extension allowing doctors to use telehealth tools to evaluate, counsel, and monitor patients.

  • A nationwide reciprocity of medical licensing, to enable Americans everywhere to access the health care they need.

As the Congressional letter makes clear, “These two related reforms are straightforward and common sense, leveraging the latest medical knowledge with the advancing power of technology. They would also help accelerate the overdue transformation of American health care, which must quickly adapt in significant ways to overcome the current pandemic and better prepare for future challenges.”

Digital health—collecting, sharing, and using information about our health to improve well-being or treat disease—was used inconsistently until the Coronavirus hit our shores.

Dr. David Adams, Cardiac Surgeon-in-Chief, Mount Sinai Health Systems tells RealClearHealth:

“One of the big lessons this pandemic has taught us is the power of telemedicine to safely deliver quality care to millions of patients. In a sense, it is restoring our ability to provide house calls and democratizing access to medical expertise, no matter where a patient lives. In just a few months, telemedicine has transformed the delivery of individualized patient care, particularly to some of our most vulnerable populations.”

The reforms stressed by this robust group of physicians will “accelerate the overdue transformation of American health care, which must quickly adapt in significant ways to overcome the current pandemic and better prepare for future challenges.”

RealClearHealth recognizes that by necessity we are replacing or combining digital services and products with traditional face-to-face care. We cannot go backwards. Twenty-first Century medicine demands the permanent extension of telehealth tools and the reciprocity of medical licensing. Indeed, digital health has been more a talking point or a slogan. Now that a vast number of Americans have benefitted from digital health, consumers are more comfortable using it as a solution.

Now is the time to act.


Tech billionaire Elon Musk is currently busy bringing out new advancements via Neuralink—a startup founded in 2016 to develop an "ultra-high bandwidth brain-machine interface." Linking human brains to computers, using tiny implants may sound like every interesting, but experts are wary that it could make the humankind vulnerable to hackers.

Recently experts have raised concern over the use of such technology and said the hackers could access these brain-computer interfaces (BCIs). They said the cybercriminals can erase the skills stored in our brains and read thoughts, as well as memories. If that happens it will be the worst data breach ever detected in the history of humankind.

The Risk Factors Should Not be Overlooked

While talking to Zdnet, experts advised that to ensure the safety of such technology, the system needs to make sure that no unauthorized person can gain access or modify the functionality—just the way antivirus works in smartphones.

As per the South-African billionaire Musk, Neuralink will one day allow the human brains to interface with computers to avoid being dominated by artificial intelligence in the future. He also claimed that the BCI would help humans to cure injuries, depression, and other tissues of the body. It sounds like concept from Netflix's popular sci-fi series "Black Mirror"—a next-gen tech which is too good to be true.

The experts have expressed their worries about the technology while warning that the brain chip could open up a window for trespassing by the hacker's community. They are concerned about the possibility that cybercriminals can peep into the thoughts or memories of political officials and military personnel, while other threat actors can carry out their own digital attacks, causing massive devastation.

As per the report, Dr. Sasitharan Balasubramaniam, director of research at the Waterford Institute of Technology's Telecommunication Software and Systems Group (TSSG), said the concerning part is the idea of what type of damage a digital attack can cause in the human brain, "will it erase your skills or disrupt your skills?"

"Would they [the hacks] come in the form of just new information put into the brain, or would it even go down to the level of damaging neurons that then leads to a rewiring process within the brain," resulting in a disruption in the thinking process, said Dr. Balasubramaniam adding that "It's not only at the information level, it could also be the physical damage as well."

The Vulnerability

The cybercriminals could intercept data traveling from BCI to the brain that will allow the hackers to gather sensitive information such as login details for emails and other systems. The experts also noted that the threat actors could transmit malicious software to the technology. This would allow the cybercriminals to show the user images or feed fraudulent versions of the neural inputs to control the brain chip.

But as per researchers at Israel's Ben-Gurion University of the Negev wrote in a recent paper that the attempts to trick such biometric technology "will likely be very difficult," as the brainwaves are not visible compared to other biometrics like a fingerprint, iris, etc, and "cannot be replicated by another person... without direct access to the person and their brain to record the person."

However, experts had urged the creators behind BCI to take a multi-layered security approach while designing the systems, including the antivirus software and encryption. The CEO of SpaceX Musk, who recently expressed his concerns over the power of AI and how it could dominate humans in the next five years, is all set to release news of a possible working prototype of the revolutionary brain chip on August 28.

During these tumultuous times, as practically every American institution comes under attack from the far left and its allies, two of our most essential values seem to be especially targeted in an effort to “transform America.”

Those values are faith and family, the two essential pillars that serve as true stabilizing factors in any society.

The attacks on faith and family seem to be relentless.

In Nevada, amid the COVID-19 crisis, casinos are open, but churches are told they must remain closed.

In California, Gov. Gavin Newsom told churches that their congregants no longer could sing worship songs, even though they are wearing protective masks while doing so. In Portland, Oregon, radicals not only are burning the flag but Bibles as well. And tragically, in the same vein, vandals are targeting churches.

So, how did we get to this point? It didn’t happen overnight.

It is not a coincidence that our current cultural condition, and the turn to hard-left progressivism, began in the late 1950s and into the 1960s, as these values started to erode and lose influence in American society.

Those on the far left actively were launching attacks—sometimes stealthily—through seizing all the major corridors of cultural and political influence.

When these pillars of faith and family—both of which are key components of the Judeo-Christian principles upon which our nation was founded—started to come under attack, all other principles such as fiscal restraint, freedom of conscience, and limited government came under assault as well.

Regarding the family, several factors led our nation down the progressive path and away from conservatism. The social engineering of President Lyndon Johnson’s liberal Great Society of the mid-1960s devastated the family, as fathers no longer had to accept fiscal responsibility for the children they bore.

Legalized abortion greatly devalued human life and further enabled personal irresponsibility and selfish, rather than selfless, behavior. No-fault divorce made it easy for either spouse to walk away from the commitment of “until death do us part,” leaving a trail of broken children behind.

And attacks on the fundamental beliefs of the faithful created a culture where those beliefs not only were mocked but increasingly criminalized. One example: the persecution of those who do not wish to use their skills to participate in facilitating abortions.

On the faith front, many mainline denominations swapped out the Gospel for social justice and the abandonment of absolute truth. This left a spiritual vacuum for progressive thought—which sought governmental, rather than faith-based, solutions—to fill. Lost were the virtues of prudence, justice, fortitude, and temperance—all of which are needed for society to thrive.

Thus, once the pillars of faith and the family were weakened, the rest of the house started to collapse, just as Abraham Lincoln warned the nation in 1858 that “a house divided against itself cannot stand.”

With the gap that was left by the removal of these two pillars of faith and family, progressives were able to introduce policies that destabilized rather than stabilized society. One such policy: encouraging single parenting, which has led to the tragic loss of fathers—an essential individual in every child’s life—in ever-increasing numbers.

Progressives attacked religious freedom and the role churches play in creating a “safety net” that government never could—by feeding both the body and the soul.
Much of the current out-of-control government spending is tied to government takeover and destruction of both these institutions, which taught self-reliance and personal responsibility.

We wrote at length about this in our book “American Restoration: How Faith, Family, and Personal Sacrifice Can Heal Our Nation,” which provides a conservative, faith-based response to our nation’s various ailments.

The breakdown of the family has been a primary factor in the societal chaos we are experiencing. It has led to massive government spending that enables the very behaviors that continue a cycle of despair and destabilization.

The decreased role of faith has led to the breakdown of community, neighbors helping neighbors, and the other societal supports that government cannot recreate but tries to—again through more massive spending, which only perpetuates problems instead of solving them.

The disregard for—and eventual mocking of—religious faith and the values of selflessness and personal responsibility it instills have led to a nation that values its privileges over its principles.
And the result of that, as President Dwight Eisenhower warned us in his 1953 inaugural address, is that a nation “soon loses both.”

Why? Because both family and faith go to the essence of what makes a healthy society. A functional, healthy family provides for and equips the next generation to be self-reliant citizens, not dependent upon government programs for their sustenance. It provides the next generation with the tools and the confidence to succeed in life.

In addition, a young boy who grows up with a strong father as a role model—a father who leads by example of how to love his wife, shepherd his children, and make sacrifices that benefit both—likely will follow in his father’s footsteps. A young boy without that model will try to figure it out on his own—often with disastrous results.

In the same way, a young girl who knows what it is to be valued and loved by a man will make good decisions regarding future relationships. Those good decisions will result in less need for government intrusion and taxpayer support.

In many ways, the church does this as well. It provides a moral framework that teaches that all people are worthy of dignity and respect as they have been created Imago Dei—in the image of God.

For the principles of limited government and a republican government to succeed, morality must be part of the equation. John Adams, signer of the Declaration of Independence and the second president of the United States, recognized this fact when he wrote to the Massachusetts Militia in 1798: “Our Constitution was made only for a moral and religious People. It is wholly inadequate to the government of any other.”
Or as Benjamin Franklin wrote: “Only a virtuous people are capable of freedom. As nations become corrupt and vicious, they have more need of masters.”

Progressivism is a master that restricts freedom; conservatism seeks to expand freedom, which can be expanded only if a society is virtuous.

Thus, with a moral framework in place, people are more self-reliant, more likely to make healthy decisions that benefit society rather than poor ones that result in dependence on government. With healthy families, children will thrive and make positive contributions to society. With a strong faith, and the virtues it instills, society will flourish.

And, sadly, when those values are attacked and weakened, society suffers and descends into personal and corporate chaos. The result is the antithesis of what the left professes it seeks to advance, which is unity (on its terms) and progress. Instead, all we are left with is the bitter fruit of division and descension into cultural darkness.

The battle to overcome this darkness is daunting, but it can be won if we stand up to these attacks on faith, family, and conscience rather than slink away in retreat. As our Founding Fathers wrote, only a moral, righteous, and virtuous people can be free.

If future generations are going to enjoy the freedoms we have cherished, we must return to the moral framework that made these freedoms possible in the first place. Once that moral foundation is rebuilt, America’s house once again can stand strong, united against any storm it may face.