In Florida, a summer of death and resistance as the coronavirus rampaged

As Florida appears to be turning the corner from a coronavirus rampage that fueled record new infections, hospitalizations and deaths, its residents and leaders are surveying the damage left from more than 7,000 deaths reported since July Fourth and the scars inflicted by feuds over masks and vaccines. New infections were averaging more than 22,000 a day in the last days of August but have fallen to about 19,000. Yet recovery could prove fleeting: Holiday weekends such as Labor Day have acted as a tinderbox for earlier outbreaks, and late summer marks the return of students to college campuses.

Health-care workers process the trauma of witnessing mass suffering and death that could have been averted if only more people had been immunized.

And hospital leaders exhale as covid-19 admissions appear to have subsided from a peak of more than 17,000 in late August, dipping to about 15,000. The decline follows weeks of frenzy as a slew of hospitals treated more patients than at any point in the pandemic, reassigning employees, postponing surgeries and treating patients in hallways and reconfigured rooms.

as of Thursday, Florida averaged 325 newly reported deaths daily in the preceding seven days, the highest since the pandemic started.

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