A second Sumter County resident has tested positive for the Coronavirus.
The Sumter County Health Department made the announcement late Thursday afternoon and said it was unknown if the man’s case was travel related.
The first Sumter County resident to test positive for the Coronavirus did so at UF Health Leesburg Hospital. One news agency reported Wednesday that the man is a Villages residents. That was not confirmed to Villages-News.com and according to the Florida Department of Health, that kind of personal information is protected for anyone who is being monitored, has pending tests results or has tested negative for the virus.
Dr. Sanford D. Zelnick, director of the Sumter County Health Department, said Thursday that while there is limited testing capacity in Sumter County, there still are 15-20 specimens being collected for analysis on a daily basis.
“It is expected as additional testing capacity is mobilized, that additional cases of infection will be identified,” he said.
Zelnick also implored residents to refrain from participating in community activities if they are ill. He said that includes outdoor and indoor activities, recreational and non-recreational.
“Please stay at home to the greatest extent possible under those circumstances,” he said, while also encouraging area residents to avoid visiting areas of the country that have much higher rates of COVID-19 cases.
As of late Thursday afternoon, 102 of the close to 847,000 people who call the tri-county area home had been tested for the Coronavirus.
Forty-six of those tests were done in Sumter County, which includes a large majority of both Villages homes and the mega-retirement community’s population of about 130,000 people. In addition to the two positive results, 26 came back negative and 18 are pending.
Nineteen Lake County residents have been checked, with two men and a Lady Lake woman testing positive. The first two were deemed travel-related cases and it’s unknown if the third man had traveled abroad. Seven others tested negative and nine results still are pending.
In Marion County, there still have been no positive COVID-19 cases. All told, 37 people have been tested, with 27 coming back negative and 10 still pending.
Across Florida, there are 432 cases of the Coronavirus, which includes 393 Sunshine State residents and 39 non-residents. There have been nine deaths, 1,533 negative tests and 1,019 pending results.
Late Thursday afternoon, Gov. Ron DeSantis said 90 of the 390 who have tested positive have been hospitalized.
“That’s actually a reduction in the percentage of hospitalizations than we were looking at about a week ago,” he said.
DeSantis also pointed out that Broward and Miami-Dade counties, with 182 cases between them, have almost half of the positive results in the state.
“The vast, vast majority of counties either have zero or in single digits,” he said.
DeSantis said Florida is starting to receive some of the swabs he has asked for so more tests can be completed. He said several thousand already have arrived and he has been assured by the United States Department of Health and Human Services that another shipment is on the way.
“That should be several thousand more,” he said. “We’re working on getting as many as we can.”
DeSantis said 2,500 testing kits and the positive/negative controls that go with them have been distributed across the state, which would provide for 625,000 tests.
“But you need the swabs to be able to get the sample,” he said.
DeSantis also offered a warning to the younger generations who typically don’t face as big a risk from the Coronavirus as senior citizens or those with underlying medical conditions and immune deficiencies. His warning also applies to The Villages, as many grandchildren are visiting the community while schools are closed across the nation.
“What we’re starting to see is some of the younger folks, it can knock them on their butt,” he said. “This can be really tough. It’s not something that you want to be very cavalier about. And obviously, we’d hope you’ll think of others in terms of what you’re doing.”