Agriculture Commissioner Nikki Fried held her daily coronavirus update today and reported some staggering figures for Florida.
Fried says some 15,840 Floridians are currently hospitalized with COVID-19 and 48.9 percent of all ICU beds in the state are occupied by someone with the virus.
“If Florida were a country, it would be the second most infected place on the planet."
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Fried says rising pediatric cases and hospitalizations has not dissuaded Republican Gov. Ron DeSantis from walking back his ban on mask mandates in K-12 schools.
“Florida has seen a 550 percent increase in COVID cases among children and a 520 percent increase in children hospitalized with COVID over the last month.”
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This news comes as the White House Coronavirus Task Force found 40 percent of all new COVID-19-related hospitalizations in the US come from Florida and Texas.