Amy Green

Hospital officials from across Florida addressed members of the Florida House Pandemic and Public Emergencies Committee, calling impacts of the ongoing COVID-19 pandemic “devastating,” and highlighting the financial toll that treating COVID-19 hospitalized patients is having on healthcare systems.Hospitals in Southwest Florida continue to report declines in their populations of hospitalized COVID-19 patients even as the death toll remains high. State health officials reported 2,468 new COVID-19 deaths across Florida over the past week, bringing the statewide death toll from the pandemic to 51,240 fatalities.A Sarasota store owner has filed a lawsuit against Florida’s Surgeon General challenging a law that bars business owners from requiring proof of customers’ vaccination status before entering.

Two lawsuits over mask wearing in Florida schools will get hearings today. A state judge is considering whether local school district mandates will be able to stay in place until an appeals court weighs in on a ruling last month that struck down Gov. Ron DeSantis’ executive order barring school districts from imposing student mask mandates. A separate federal suit arguing that kids with disabilities and severe medical conditions are so vulnerable that they won’t be able to go to school unless everyone is wearing a mask.Statewide COVID-19 infections and hospitalizations are on the decline. Health officials are cautiously optimistic as hospital resources remain strained.More COVID-19 cases have been reported in Lee County schools in the first four weeks of this school year than were reported in the entire last school year. The number of COVID infections reported in Collier County Schools is on pace to surpass the last school year’s total by the end of this month.Gas prices in Florida over the Labor Day holiday weekend were at their highest level in seven years due to the pandemic and impacts from Hurricane Ida.

Governor Ron DeSantis has appealed a Leon County Circuit Court Judge’s ruling striking down his executive order barring school districts from imposing student mask mandates.Florida Commissioner of Education Richard Corcoran sent a letter, last week, threatening to withhold state funding from the Lee County School district due to its mask-wearing policy for students, which only allows students to opt-out with a doctor’s note.The Florida Department of Health, last month, changed the way it reports the number of deaths from COVID-19 to a method that misleads people into believe there's been a decline in deaths.The Orlando Utilities Commission is reminding customers to conserve water as an unprecedented surge in the coronavirus causes a shortage of liquid oxygen. Two weeks after making the request, the utility says customers are saving on water, but not enough.With Florida legislative committee meetings starting later this month in advance of the 2022 annual law-making session, the state Senate is not planning to limit public access as Florida continues battling the COVID-19 pandemic.The Carnival Cruise Line plans to require proof of vaccination for passengers when cruises resume from some Florida ports in November.Federal COVID rental assistance relief funds in Sarasota and Manatee County have been slow to reach residents in need.

U.S. Education Secretary Miguel Cardona says his agency is ready to investigation Florida’s ban on masks in schools. The Governor’s executive order banning mask mandates in schools is being challenged in a lawsuit brought by parents. A judge begins hearing evidence in that case today (08/23).Sarasota School board members, Friday, adopted a school mask mandate for preK-8th grader students for 90 days.COVID-19 hospitalizations continue to inundate SWFL hospitals. Lee Health reported Friday that 819 COVID-19 patients have died throughout the system’s hospitals since the beginning of the pandemic.A state-run monoclonal antibody treatment clinic is open in Bonita Springs.Data shows that Florida’s decision to prematurely end federal unemployment benefits in June in order to get Floridians “back to work” didn’t work as intended, as unemployment has actually increased.Prominent Naples physician and LGBTQ advocate Dr. Clinton Potter died of COVID-19 last week at the age of 61.