Contact: 561-355-2754 • Public Affairs
During an afternoon news conference at the Palm Beach County Emergency Operations Center on August 9, county officials provided a COVID-19 update for county residents from the Florida Department of Health and the local medical community. Mayor Dave Kerner stated, “He understands we are fatigued and tired as a community and nation with COVID, data indicates that this is not a good time to relax our safeguards."
- The Health Care District is offering free, walk-up COVID-19 vaccinations Monday through Friday this week from 9 a.m. to 4 p.m. at:
- The Lantana Clinic parking lot at 1250 Southwinds Drive in Lantana.
- Lakeside Medical Center's parking lot. The hospital is located at 39200 Hooker Highway in Belle Glade.
It's easy, convenient and no appointments are needed.
- Local businesses and organizations interested in hosting the Health Care District's mobile vaccination clinic for their employees and clients can visit
www.hcdpbc.org, click the purple “Mobile Clinic Vaccination & Community Event Request" button and submit the completed form for review and approval.
The county and the state have also partnered to open up another public testing site at the Mid County Senior Center. That site is open from 9 AM to 7 PM and is located at 3680 Lake Worth Road.
We want to remind the public that there are many options available for residents to get testing. Besides the many locations found on our website,
www.pbcgov.com, most commercial pharmacies and physician's offices are able to do COVID testing for little or no cost. In addition to providing testing, many of these locations also offer vaccines.
Dr. Alina Alonso, director of the Florida Department of Health-Palm Beach County gave some updates to our numbers as of Sunday, August 8, Palm Beach County had 790 confirmed new cases of coronavirus and our positivity rate was 16.44%. Our seven-day average is 16.03%. Vaccinations rates are up since July 1, in the age group 12-14 by 4% and the age group of 15-19 by 3%. At this time, we are 67% vaccinated here in Palm Beach County. “The only way out of this at this time is to vaccinate," Dr. Alonso said. “We need to dispel rumors and encourage our neighbors, friends and family to get vaccinated."
Dr. Raymond Golish, the Chief Medical Officer at JFK Medical Center stated that, “the vast majority of people sick enough to require admission to the hospital are unvaccinated."
Dr. Mazyar Rouhani, the Emergency Director at JFK Medical Center, reiterated this statement and expanded on it by saying “the only way to decrease transmission is to get vaccinated." He also stated that JFK had to increase their footprint to 96 beds to accommodate the increase in admissions, of which the majority are unvaccinated.
On a separate issue, there is currently a tropical wave that has a 70% chance of development within the next 5 days. The track and intensity of the system is uncertain at this time. What we do know is that planning to go into a congregate shelter setting is not the best option during this resurgence of COVID-19 therefore, we encourage those residents that normally seek refuge in a shelter to consider making arrangements with friends and family members should a storm approach.