COVID-19 live updates: Here’s what to know in South Florida on August 14

We’re keeping track of the latest news regarding the coronavirus in South Florida and around the state. Check back for updates throughout the day.

Fall high school sports practices— including football — can begin on Aug. 24, board decides

2:55 p.m.: The Florida High School Athletic Association’s Board of Directors voted Friday to approve Aug. 24 as start of practice for fall sports seasons amid the COVID-19 pandemic. The board voted 11-5 in favor of the plan, which will mostly keep the fall calendar intact with abbreviated regular seasons.

The plan lines up Sept. 4 as the first Friday of high school football season, less than two weeks after practices are allowed to begin. Fall sports practices were originally supposed to begin last month with the regular season beginning Aug. 20. School districts in South Florida, however, are concerned this will effectively disqualify them from state championship contention as the region continues to struggle with COVID-19. Neither Miami-Dade County nor Broward County have announced when they will allow practices to begin for member schools.

Read the story here.

Is partial ‘herd immunity’ slowing Miami’s COVID spread?

2:35 p.m.: Miami-Dade County officials and scientists are trying to figure out what combination of factors may have contributed to slowing a surge of COVID cases that at one point threatened to topple South Florida’s healthcare infrastructure.

Social distancing measures, face mask orders and curfews certainly helped, public health experts say, but so did other factors that they’re still working to understand — specifically, the seasonality of the virus and so-called herd immunity, which occurs when enough people in an area are infected with a virus to nearly eliminate transmission.

Miami-Dade’s total infection rate could range from 10% to as high as 30% of the county’s population. That’s still far from reaching the threshold where herd immunity could reduce transmission to zero. The threshold for the novel coronavirus is still being debated, but is generally thought to require at least a 60% infection rate.

Read the story here.

Florida reports more than 220 new coronavirus deaths, pushing toll past 9,100

11:50 a.m.: Florida’s Department of Health on Friday confirmed 6,178 additional cases of COVID-19, pushing the state’s known total to 563,315. An additional 228 Florida resident deaths were also announced, bring the statewide resident death toll to 9,141.

Read the story here.

Hurricane evacuation + COVID = double disaster, survey says

11:20 a.m.: According to a study by scientists at Columbia University and the Union of Concerned Scientists, a large-scale hurricane evacuation would increase COVID-19 cases in both the places evacuees’ fled from and the counties they fled to.

The study is awaiting publication in a peer-reviewed journal.

The researchers delivered their findings on Columbia University’s Earth Institute’s State of the Planet web page on Thursday.

“Directing evacuees to destinations with low virus activity and providing housing opportunities and resources that help maintain social distancing, encourage mask usage, and limiting opportunities for virus transmission will be essential,” said senior author Jeffrey Shaman, a professor at Columbia’s Mailman School of Public Health and the Earth Institute, and director of the university’s Climate and Health Program.

“Many of the country’s most hurricane-prone states have recently experienced some of the highest COVID-19 growth rates in the nation,” added coauthor Kristy Dahl, a senior climate scientist at the Union of Concerned Scientists.

South Florida was chosen as the hypothetical scenario given its risk for storms and the number of confirmed coronavirus cases.

The research was based on a hypothetical evacuation scenario in which residents would flee from a Category 3 hurricane. The focus was on Miami-Dade, Broward, Palm Beach and Monroe counties. The number of combined cases and deaths from the coronavirus are the highest in the state, especially in Miami-Dade.

According to Columbia University, the study assumed 2.3 million people would leave the four counties. Post-Hurricane Irma surveys were used to simulate where they would go.

“That information was then used in a national county-scale model of COVID-19 transmission to determine how many cases would result from the evacuations and where they would occur,” researchers wrote.

Under the worst-case scenario the authors considered, if people followed historic evacuation patterns and virus transmission rates increased by 20% in the places they seeked shelter, there would be about 61,000 additional COVID-19 cases in the origin and destination counties combined.

Under the best-case scenario, if people instead evacuated to communities with low COVID-19 transmission rates and transmission rates did not increase in the destination counties, there could be as few as 9,100 additional cases resulting from the evacuation.

The point of the study, scientists said, was to make sure emergency managers and other local and federal decision makers, are on board with enforcing proper protocols such as social distancing and requiring masks.

Coral Gables travel agency offers $250 credit for travelers who get tested for COVID-19

10:15 a.m.: When Felix Brambilla saw people crowded at Key West bars in June after the city reopened to tourists, he worried about the risk of COVID-19 spread.

As the owner of a Coral Gables-based travel agency, Brambilla has pivoted his business to focus almost exclusively on U.S. travel since the COVID-19 pandemic dried up his usual international clientele.

In an effort to limit the spread of COVID-19 while keeping the tourism business afloat, his travel agency, Overseas Leisure Group, is offering a $250 credit for people who get tested for the virus within 72 hours before their trips. Since the program, dubbed the “Responsible Traveler Challenge” launched last month, 218 travelers have taken advantage of the credit, Brambilla said.

Read the story here.

Friday Night Flashbacks

9:40 a.m.: Since the COVID-19 pandemic wiped out in-house theatrical seasons for everyone, and Actors’ Playhouse at the Miracle Theatre in Coral Gables is no exception, artistic director David Arisco has hosted weekly Friday Night Flashbacks on Facebook Live.

For fans of the theater — or theater in general — the series, at 7 p.m. Fridays via Actors’ Playhouse’s Facebook page, features Arisco in conversation with actors and other stage crew from previous productions in Zoom-like fashion. The 30-minute or so chats are lively, insightful and offer videos that look back at plays and musicals the group has staged, including “West Side Story,” “Ragtime” and “Next to Normal.”

This Friday, Aug. 14, AP features a behind-the-scenes look at its last production before the theater had to halt the 2019-20 season: the ABBA musical Mamma Mia!

Stars of the show Jodie Langel, Margot Moreland and Mandy Striph, along with some special guests will be featured.

To make a donation to help support the theater text GIVEAP to 243725.

Hand sanitizers made in China, Texas, North Carolina now on the FDA’s Do Not Use list

8:40 a.m.: The FDA’s Do Not Use hand sanitizer list, once a roll call of Mexican-made hand sanitizers with methanol, now includes hand sanitizers from China, Texas, North Carolina, Georgia and Utah.

And methanol’s been joined by 1-propanol as a prohibited “toxic” ingredient.

Read the story here.

CATCH UP TO START THE DAY

8:15 a.m.: Here are the coronavirus headlines to catch you up on what’s happening around South Florida and the state as Friday begins.

▪ Florida adds 8,109 coronavirus cases as death toll passes 8,700.

▪ When are movie theaters reopening in South Florida? Two are about to, with COVID rules.

▪ COVID-19’s toll extends beyond record deaths, the sick and unemployed. Wear a mask | Opinion