A top Florida Department of Health official said Saturday that three laboratories in the state can now test for the novel coronavirus, the contagious disease known as COVID-19.
Deputy Secretary of Health Shamarial Roberson told The News Service of Florida that state laboratories in Jacksonville, Miami and Tampa can conduct tests instead of sending samples to federal Centers for Disease Control and Prevention labs in Atlanta.
“It is good news,” Roberson said, adding, “it leads to more timely testing.”
Before the state was able to conduct the tests, it would take three to five days for results. But now, it will take one to two days, according to Roberson.
The announcement that Florida has started conducting its own testing came hours after Washington Gov. Jay Inslee said in a statement that a King County, Wash., resident had died from COVID-19. It was the first confirmed death in the U.S. from the virus.
Florida has not had any confirmed cases of COVID-19. State Surgeon General Scott Rivkees, who is secretary of the Department of Health, announced Friday that the agency was monitoring 150 people for COVID-19 and that 15 people had tested negative for the deadly virus. Another four people, Rivkees said, were still under investigation.
In addition to Florida conducting its own testing, Roberson said the state has revised guidelines about which residents should be tested for COVID-19. The new guidelines are based on federal recommendations and include testing people who fall into two main categories.
The first group includes people who have recently traveled to and from China, South Korea, Iran, Italy and Japan and have fever and acute upper respiratory infections. Testing also is recommended for people who have been in close contact with someone who has tested positive for COVID-19 and are suffering from the symptoms.
In addition to those groups, Roberson said the Department of Health is recommending COVID-19 testing for people who have been hospitalized with fevers and acute upper respiratory infections but who have tested negative for influenza.
Roberson said people who fall into those categories and want to be tested should first call county health departments, which are charged with collecting samples. The collections are done by swabbing people’s noses or throats. County health department telephone numbers can be obtained from the state Department of Health website.
The coronavirus and its rapid spread from Wuhan, China — where it was first reported on Dec. 31— to another 51 countries has garnered widespread attention. No vaccine exists for the virus, and federal health officials say a vaccine won’t be ready for another year to 18 months.
The Washington state resident who died had not been previously confirmed to have COVID-19, according to officials. Moreover, officials believe the virus was spread through the community and not from travel. Inslee has declared a public health emergency.
As of Friday, the World Health Organization reported 83,652 confirmed cases of the virus. Most of those cases, 78,961, were in China, where nearly 2,800 people had died.
–Christine Sexton, News Service of Florida
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steve Ward says
To get the Data testing needs to be done on a large scale and damn the cost. I am cautiously optimistic that its not too late to contain this. Just because the Virus hits US soil its not going to disappear. With no vaccine from what I have read looks like a double Season of this. God Bless
A Concerned Observer says
Has anyone read “The Stand” by Stephen King? Interesting conspiracy theory. SCARY!
Jane Gentile-Youd says
Thank you Pierre and Flagler Live.com for staying on top of the latest news -sometimes before anyone else it seems.
Jimbo99 says
This must be the CDC’s acknowledgement that it’s beyond their capacity at this point. That or the Federal Government has given Insurance companies, Hospitals & Labs the green light to bill at will on this. The Healthcare system only falls all over themselves for low risk & high return labs & procedures. Will be interesting to see what the out of pocket or Medicare/Medicaid Billable is for all of this when the panic phase is over & done ? If this is anything like Ebola (Africa), CoronaVirus is the Asian tainted bush meat virus. And the CDC has only so much capacity for patients. There are now 56 ETC’s, if this goes viral, many are simply going to die from it.
https://wwwnc.cdc.gov/eid/article/26/5/19-1245_article
What is the truth though is unknown, The wiki indicates at the time of it’s writing they could handle 11 patients in 4 bio-containment units. Who gets care & who doesn’t as usual with this unaffordable healthcare system ?
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ebola_virus_cases_in_the_United_States#Biocontainment_units_in_the_U.S.
Agkistrodon says
20000 people in the USA died from flu in 2018-19 season. Didn’t seem to be this much hype. Perhaps a modicum of common sense is in order.
oldtimer says
Right on the money Agkistrodon, remember Sars and Ebola? This the media making news.
Matt says
Anybody remember the Ebola outbreak and how fast and efficient Obama handled the situation? He worked fast and diligently to protect us at all costs. Where as Trump has done nothing calling the disease a hoax and claiming media is lying and over reacting.
Ben Dover says
Matt , Trump fired that pandemic team Obama put together and de-funded their dept , he`s a moron that is gonig to cause many people to die , but lets not forget the idiots we have right here , the ones going ahead with Bike Week , they are going to end up infecting every man child and woman in Volusia and Flagler counties , they might as well just start shooting us , WTF is the difference?
Steve says
Hows this for hype. Inept Government response. Not enough Test kits early Testing and the folks who are uninsured or under Insured will have to pay or not seek treatment due to affordability potentially spreading a Global Virus with no vaccine with potential to develop into The Pandemic it is and kill 100s of Thousands. What flavor Kool Aid you drinking today.
Florida Voter says
Yes, common sense should still prevail: wash your hand. BUT:
“The virus that causes COVID-19 seems to be spreading easily and sustainably in the community”1
“…about 5% of patients have critical disease including respiratory failure, septic shock and multi-organ failure.
In 2% of reported cases, the virus is fatal…” 2 … taking the Spanish Flu as a model, 1/3 of people get sick, so 2% of 1/3 of the US population is over 2 million; 100 times the 20,000 people you references for the 18-19 season.
I hope that in the US, the fatality rate would be significantly lower, but we don’t know yet. There are still a LOT of unknowns (how dangerous are contaminated surfaces … how long does the virus live outside of a host … is this virus seasonal … etc).
THAT is what makes this virus significant.
1 https://www.cdc.gov/coronavirus/2019-ncov/about/transmission.html
2 https://www.who.int/dg/speeches/detail/who-director-general-s-remarks-at-the-media-briefing-on-covid-2019-outbreak-on-17-february-2020
Sherry says
OK. . . the question still remains. . . Will the testing, and “treatment/quarantine” be FREE for all those uninsured/underinsured?
Traveling Rep says
Nothing is FREE! Someone always pays…
CB from PC says
Ok Folks, these are State Labs, and it follows that they are run by the State of Florida, and Republican DeSantis is Governor of Florida.
It is a start towards knowing how many are infected, and hence the magnitude.
It is absurdly unrealistic to require the population of Florida to submit to a test in order to get “data”.
And, even if the testing is done on the entire population of Florida, the “data” will be invalid should a large number of people have an infection too early in the incubation stage to be detected.
Use some common sense, like stay off planes and cruise ships, and away from large crowds.
Matt says
Trump single handedly dismantled the CDC leaving the US open to infection. Unfortunately they have already failed at stopping the virus from reaching us by not allowing cdc personel to wear the proper protection and going as far as discipling the employee who brought the issue up.
Anybody remember the Ebola outbreak and how fast and efficient Obama handled the situation? He worked fast and diligently to protect us at all costs. Where as Trump has done nothing calling the disease a hoax and claiming media is lying and over reacting.
Sherry says
This directly from the CDC:
Key Points:
Outpatient ILI and clinical laboratory data remain elevated but decreased for the second week in a row. The percentage of specimens testing positive for both influenza A and influenza B viruses decreased.
Overall, hospitalization rates remain similar to this time during recent seasons, but rates among school aged children and young adults are higher at this time than in recent seasons and rates among children 0-4 years old are now the highest CDC has on record at this point in the season, surpassing rates reported during the second wave of the 2009 H1N1 pandemic.
Pneumonia and influenza mortality has been low, but 125 influenza-associated deaths in children have been reported so far this season. This number is higher for the same time period than in every season since reporting began in 2004-05, except for the 2009 pandemic.
CDC estimates that so far this season there have been at least 32 million flu illnesses, 310,000 hospitalizations and 18,000 deaths from flu.
Interim estimates of 2019-2020 flu vaccine effectiveness were released last week. So far this season, flu vaccines are reducing doctor’s visits for flu illness by 45% overall and 55% in children.
Antiviral medications are an important adjunct to flu vaccine in the control of influenza. Almost all (>99%) of the influenza viruses tested this season are susceptible to the four FDA-approved influenza antiviral medications recommended for use in the U.S. this season.
PLEASE- Do The Math. . . 32 million cases of the Flu, and yet only a very tiny percentage (18,000) deaths. As far as we know, the fatality rate for the Corona virus “may” be much higher. Also, there will be NO vaccine for at least a year to 18 months.
This is “precisely” why our government should NOT be run like a “Capitalist” business! We need “LONG RANGE” thinking/planning/training/research for many, many areas of our common interests and our common good! We need to be “PREPARED” for disasters, NOT JUST react to them! We should heed, and act on the advice of our scientists . . . NOT the politicians!
Well... says
Considering new reports say this has been circulating for at least six weeks in this country virtually undetected, it’s about time. Now they need to get their act together and create and distribute as many test kits as possible to randomly test those that come in with symptoms regardless of their travel history. If they do this I’m almost certain they will find this is community spread in many areas of the country. If more countries had the ability to randomly test people there is no doubt suspected/confirmed cases would near a million or more.
In some areas of the country hospitals have been quarantining and treating people as though they have COVID-19 because the CDC had/has such a narrow scope for testing. This isn’t conspiracy. This is posted on medical boards. Healthmap.org first reported this in early December. I monitor that site daily and China was well aware as the reports today stated. They covered it up. The US covered up the fact it’s been widespread for weeks. They tried to keep things calm but it only incited panic because of how quickly the cases have risen in such a short time. Chances are you will get this or have it or even had it. You may know someone that dies from it. The worst thing is personal hygiene. People are gross and inconsiderate. They are more dangerous to your own health than anything else.
Dr Know says
If you have a running nose and sputum when you have a cold it cannot be a new type of coronavirus pneumonia, because coronavirus pneumonia is a dry cough without runny nose. This is the simplest way to identify. Please tell your friends that if you know more about medical knowledge, you will have more awareness of identification and prevention.
This time, the Wuhan virus is not heat-resistant and will be killed at a temperature of 26-27 degrees Celcius.Therefore, drink more hot water. You can tell your friends and relatives to drink more hot water to prevent it. Go under the sun. It has been cold recently, and drinking hot water is also very comfortable. It is not a cure and is good for the body. Drinking warm water is effective for all viruses. Try not to drink with ice, remember!
Doctor’s advice about coronavirus:
It is pretty large in size (cell is about 400-500nm diameter), so any normal mask (not just the N95 feature) should be able to filter it out. However, when someone who’s infected sneezes in front of you, it will take a great 3 meters (about 10 feet) before it drops to the ground and is no longer airborne.
When the virus drops on metal surface, it will live for at least 12 hours. So remember if you come in contact with any metal surface, wash your hands with soap thoroughly.
The virus can remain active on fabric for 6-12 hours. Normal laundry detergent should kill the virus. For winter clothing that does not require daily washing, you can put it out under the sun to kill the virus.
About the symptoms of the pneumonia caused by Coronavirus:
It will first infect the throat, so the throat will have the dry sore throat feeling which will last for 3 to 4 days
Then the virus will blend into the nasal fluid and drips into the trachea and enter the lungs, causing pneumonia. This process will take 5 to 6 days.
With pneumonia, comes high fever and difficulty in breathing. The nasal congestion is not like the normal kind. You will feel like you are drowning in water. It’s important to go seek immediate medical attention if you feel like this.
About prevention:
The most common way of getting infected is by touching things in public, so you must wash your hands frequently. The virus can only live on your hands for 5-10 mins, but a lot can happen in those 5-10 mins (you can rub your eyes or pick your nose unwittingly).
Aside from washing your hands frequently, you can gargle with Betadine Sore Throat Gargle to eliminate or minimize the germs while they are still in your throat (before dripping down to your lungs).
Concerned Citizen says
What no one has addressed yet is constitutionality of quarentining.
How are the legalities being handled by quarentining American Citizens with the virus. Is it court ordered? Are you placed under arrest? What if you don’t go willingly because a quarentine will be a major set back? What happens when a quarentine is imposed then you are found virus free? Or it was a false test.
I fully understand the thought behind quarentining. I understand how measures need to be taken to safe guard others. However things get a bit dicey when the government can just take you into custody under a health scare.
One only has to look back to the American Civil War and see how the suspension of Habeas Corpus went. Or fast forward to WW2 and the shameful “internment” of Japanese American citizens played out.
We need to make sure our rights aren’t taken away under a pretense of a “major epidemic”.
Spunkylas says
I personally try to stay out of public places.
I already bought supplies weeks ago.
Please be careful and don’t forget about pets.
Willy Boy says
How do those spit kit samples get to the lab. Safe and securely handled not doubt.
Ashton says
Look up the statistics on flu deaths, distracted driving deaths, dui/dwi deaths. Perspective can be helpful.
Doug says
Thank you mainstream media for hyping up a virus that has had less deaths than the annual flu season. What a absolute joke the media is. Where’s the concern for flu season? This proves the media controls the world’s economy and instills fear into the weak minded. If you don’t believe me, go into your local Costco, Sams Club, BJ’s, etc and try to buy water, bleach, hand sanitizer, or anything related to the common cold. The shelves are empty. Pathetic they are (media).
FlaglerLive says
In case you missed some of our coverage: