Florida Gov. Ron DeSantis said Saturday testing is up in his state but the percentage of people testing positive for the coronavirus is down, suggesting Florida is heading in a good direction in its battle against COVID-19.
About 320,000 people have been tested in Florida.
In the past two days, 37,000 people reported having coronavirus tests and less than 2,000 of those came back positive, Mr. DeSantis announced.
“What we are seeing is the percentage of people going into test that test positive is declining. Florida already had a pretty low percentage,” the governor said.
“The last week, the average positivity rate for new individuals is about 7.5 percent, so that’s a good sign things are going in a good direction,” he added.
The governor said there will continue to be increased testing and has ordered more high through-put machines for state labs.
The state also saw the lowest number of patients entering the ICU statewide in the past seven days.
Mr. DeSantis noted it appears the curve is flattening in the sunshine state.
Florida has had about 30,500 confirmed COVID-19 cases and roughly 1,000 deaths.
The state shares a large border with Georgia, which chose to begin opening back up businesses this week despite criticism from President Trump that it was a bit too soon.
Mr. DeSantis said he is still reviewing proposals from his task force about how to reopen his state. He suggested some businesses might change how they do things going forward, like limiting work travel and continuing telework arrangements.
• Alex Swoyer can be reached at aswoyer@washingtontimes.com.
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