Florida's Latest News

Shevrin Jones’ bill would add level of protection for struggling species

Coming off the endangered species list is no guarantee a species’ continued survival is going swimmingly. Consider the manatee.

Four years since getting dropped from the endangered species list, Florida’s iconic mammals are dying in record numbers. They might be Exhibit A for legislation that would require continued state monitoring of any species that gets de-listed from federal concern.

Democratic Sen. Shevrin Jones of West Park has introduced a bill (SB 238) that would require Florida officials to continue protecting endangered and threatened species, even after the federal government removes a species from its list of “endangered” or “threatened” species.

DeSantis pledges to ‘fight like hell’ over COVID-19 treatment

While Florida looks to round the corner on administering 100,000 monoclonal antibody treatments to people with COVID-19, Gov. Ron DeSantis pledged this week to “fight like hell” to continue receiving the treatments as the federal government took control over distribution of the drugs.

The U.S. Department of Health and Human Services on Monday reported on its website that the agency has “transitioned from a direct ordering process to a state/territory-coordinated distribution system,” saying that the change will give “health departments maximum flexibility to get these critical drugs where they are needed most.”

A handful of states, including Florida, have obtained the bulk of the treatments available thus far, according to White House officials.

Florida’s COVID-19 hospitalizations plunge to under 9,000; ICU patients now under 2,300

The U.S. Department of Health and Human Services' Sunday report showed 8,976 COVID-19 patients reported from 255 Florida hospitals.

That’s 417 fewer patients than Saturday’s report from 257 hospitals. In Sunday’s report, COVID-19 patients occupied 15.90% of inpatient beds in those hospital, compared with 16.11% in the previous day’s reporting hospitals.

The percentage number is based on 255 hospitals reporting 8,976 inpatient beds in use for COVID-19 patients and 56,462 total inpatient beds.

Of the people hospitalized in Florida, 2,284 people were in intensive-care units, a decrease of 97 from the previous day’s report. That represents 36.28% of the ICU beds at the 255 hospitals reporting data, compared to 36.57 the previous day and 37.71% on Friday.

Is Time Running Out For The Cape Sable Sparrow? Numbers Drop To Lowest In Five Years

The tiny Cape Sable seaside sparrow, a bird perilously perched on the edge of extinction, is getting closer to vanishing.

Helicopter surveys this year, over grassy prairies where the bird lives in Everglades National Park, detected the lowest number in five years. The surveys found none in what had once been the birds’ largest population west of Shark River Slough, an isolated group considered to be their best bet at survival.

A ground search later turned up a male and female bird in a nest. But the nest failed, said Larry Williams, Florida’s state supervisor for the U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service.

While Everglades restoration is expected to increase the sparrow’s prairie habitat elsewhere, the safer, remote area on the park’s western border has mostly switched to inhospitable sawgrass, where the birds won’t nest. Repairing it will take a decade or more, Williams said.