COVID-19 Florida

In the greater Tampa Bay region, there were nearly 40,000 new cases. The state also reported 1,727 deaths this week.

The deaths, which may have occurred over the past several days or weeks, bring the state's coronavirus overall death toll to 43,632.

The number of people in Florida's hospitals with the coronavirus rose by 76 on Wednesday, bringing the total to 17,164.

While the deaths were recorded on Saturday and Sunday, they may have occurred in previous weeks or months.

For the week ending on Thursday, the state reported an additional 150,118 cases of the coronavirus — the second highest weekly total, trailing only last week.

Polk County Fire Rescue is responding to close to 400 calls a day in Polk County, nearly 100 above the average.

The seven-day rolling average for new cases climbed to 21,375.

NPR's Debbie Elliott talks to Orlando-based epidemiologist Dr. Vincent Hsu about the state's strained health care resources amid a new surge of coronavirus cases. He says it's the worse it's ever been.

Those who end up in a hospital for COVID-19 are more than twice as likely to be hospitalized in the future for additional health problems related to a COVID-19 complication, researchers found.

About 50 ambulances a day are having to wait over an hour to offload patients because emergency rooms do not have the space or staff for new patients, officials said.

The health department, which no longer publishes daily numbers, tweeted that Friday's daily case count was actually 21,500, Saturday's was 19,567 and Sunday's was 15,319.

The temporary stay keeps in place the CDC regulations regarding Florida-based cruise ships in place, while the agency appeals a Tampa federal judge's June decision.