December 15 COVID data update

BY JENNIFER CABRERA

[Editor’s note: This information is provided to put the COVID-19 data in context and show trends. We are presenting the data as reported by Florida Department of Health with the understanding that the data is messy, and each day’s update changes multiple previous days. We believe that individuals should have access to as much information as possible so they can make decisions about their risks; you can find our opinions about government actions in the COVID-19 category on the site.]

According to the state dashboard, Alachua County reported an increase of 97 positive COVID-19 tests with an official test positivity rate of 8.45% on the 3rd consecutive day with a low number of reported test results. No new deaths were reported.

Of the people whose positive tests came back yesterday, 11 were 65 or older (this is the important number to track because those are the people who are more likely to have bad outcomes).

A total of 108 deaths have been reported in the county, 36 of which were in long-term care.

The overall number of people (from all counties) hospitalized here for COVID-19 decreased from 117 to 116.

State COVID-19 hospitalizations increased to 5,104 today.

The state reported 9,411 new positive tests (official positivity rate of 9.64%) and a net increase of 79 deaths, 20 of which were from long-term care facilities.

Changes in the number of deaths were reported on 27 different dates, going back to July 21. Changes by month: July (+1), August (+1), September (+2), November (+16-1), December (+60)

The peaks are on July 30 (234) and August 4 (237), and the 7-day moving average peak is August 5 (225).

The 7-day average plateau between July 25 and August 7 has been stable since I started reporting the peaks on August 27.

Here is the full chart for context:

The state also publishes a chart of the percentage of new tests that are positive by day (this chart is for the whole state), showing the trend over the past 14 days.

This chart shows the trend in positivity rate for Alachua County.

This chart shows the number of negative tests reported in Alachua County by day, which gives an idea of the volume of testing:

The 7-day moving average of new cases is at 94.9 through yesterday’s cases. Here is the 7-day average of new cases for the past 14 days: