Florida's public data - don't trust it.

[Pacifist Patriot]

Yes, I know I just stated the blatantly obvious. But I want to point out something in particular.

The state does show a declining number of new diagnosed cases in the last two and a half weeks. EXCEPT... the positivity rate continues to trend up. That indicates overall testing is declining in general. More specifically, the state closed 8 testing sites a few days ago because of Isaias, and they are not expected to reopen for another five days. The results from those closures may not be reflected in our numbers yet, so I expect to see even fewer cases over the next 10-15 days.

While some of my neighbors are taking this as a good sign and cause for celebration, we absolutely should not.

The side of me that sports a tinfoil hat every once in awhile, can't help but wonder if this is an attempt to justify reopening schools when that is one of the last things we should be doing.

Other than corporations stepping in with mask mandates (which is driving more people into those stores, albeit masked), Florida remains largely a leaderless COVID free-for-all. Don't look for our hot spot status to miraculously evaporate any time soon. It's just being driven underground for a spell.

[dchill]

1. I don't. I haven't.

They lead in new cases.

[Roland99]

2. Here is the likely reason (and % positive hasn't been trending up. it's been hovering)

About a month or so ago, massive testing was going on across the state. Lines for drive-thru sites were HOURS long (sometimes 6-8hours)

That created a HUGE backlog at labs across the state.

Many of those drive-thru sites have dropped significantly in numbers of people going thru as people who were returning to work have largely gone for their initial tests. We're seeing the backlog clearing out and are likely at about the max capacity of FL's testing network.

The 7-day trend for % positive (as properly calculated off the # of new first-time cases reported / # of new persons tested ... see table on page 1 of the state report, not those bar charts on the 2nd page) has hovered between 18.14% (Jul 3) and 18.16% (Aug 3 - today) with a peak at 20.85% (Jul 19).

We are now starting to see an ARTIFICIAL drop in tests and cases due to most state-run labs closed on Thursday afternoon in preparation for a possible hurricane coming through the state. That ALSO likely resulted in reduced staff at private labs/hospitals and reduced personnel to submit results from the labs (or process the results at the state's side of things). We will see noticeably LOWER numbers for several days as an artifact of all this.

I went into this here:

BEWARE - Florida Covid-19 numbers will be artificially deflated for a few days
https://www.democraticunderground.com/100213848184

and I have a discussion on the state's confusing DOH PDF daily report here:

Link to tweet

[NCjack]

3. Can't trust GOP -- they are lying to us. nt