COVID-19 rates have risen in Florida’s emergency rooms in recent weeks, according to new figures from the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention, and are now near the highs seen since the worst days of last winter’s virus wave.
The weekly average of COVID-19 emergency patients reached 2. 64% in Florida, according to the CDC’s knowledge as of Friday, and now ranks among the highest of any state during this summer’s COVID-19 wave.
Trends in Florida have also risen sharply in other key signs that officials must now track COVID-19, adding wastewater and nursing homes.
The sharp increase in COVID-19 emergency room patients in Florida echoes that of some Western states, which have noticed virus trends increasing in recent weeks.
Trends remain high across the West, even as COVID-19-related emergency room visits now appear to have peaked in Hawaii after recording some of the highest patient rates in more than a year.
“In recent weeks, some surveillance systems have shown slight national increases in COVID-19; widespread and local increases are imaginable during the summer months,” the CDC said in a bulletin released Wednesday.
Nationally, most states are now estimated to be seeing COVID-19 cases rise, CDC forecasters said this week.
A developing number of states have also begun to see COVID-19 in hospital data, the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention said Friday in its weekly report on the virus.
“Some parts of the country are experiencing a steady increase in COVID-19 activity, adding an increase in positive COVID-19 test results and emergency branch visits, as well as an increase in rates of COVID-19-associated hospitalizations among adults. 65 years and older in various places,” the firm said.
The company has been cautious in recent weeks in saying that this year’s summer COVID-19 wave has arrived, saying the recent increases are due to record degrees of the virus.
“Last winter, COVID-19 peaked in early January, eased in February and March, and in May 2024 was weaker than at any time since March 2020,” the CDC said.
Outside of Florida and the West, emergency room stay rates with the virus remain far from previous highs, despite recent increases. Overall, the CDC says national COVID-19 activity remains “low. “
In previous years, COVID-19 activity resumed at least twice a year since the start of the pandemic, once in the summer or early fall after a pause in the spring, and then again in the winter, driven by new variants of the disease. virus.
The very similar KP. 2 and KP. 3 variants are lately dominant across the country, in more than a portion of the cases in recent weeks, according to estimates released Friday through the CDC.
Behind them, a set of other variants has accelerated. LB. 1 follows in importance, with 14. 9% of cases. And in the region stretching from New Mexico to Louisiana, the CDC estimates that a new variant called KP. 4. 1 reached 17. 9% of infections on June 22.