LIVE OAK — Twelve additional cases of the COVID-19 coronavirus were announced Thursday for Suwannee County by the Florida Department of Health, raising the county’s total to 360 known cases.

The latest cases involve a 28-year-old male, 64-year-old female, 92-year-old female, 47-year-old male, 31-year-old female, 30-year-old male, 58-year-old male, 30-year-old female, 21-year-old female, 16-year-old female, 41-year-old male and a 29-year-old male. Of the 12 cases, seven are connected to existing cases; two are connected to a long-term care facility.

Additionally, the health department announced the death of a 70-year-old male previously diagnosed with COVID-19. The cause of death is pending review by the medical examiner.

There have been 3,538 tests conducted total from Suwannee County with 10% testing positive.

Recently, though, that positivity rate in the county is much higher.

In the past week, there have been 137 new cases announced for the county with 177 — nearly half of the county’s total — in the past two weeks. During that two-week span, 16.6% of the county’s 1,066 tests have returned positive, 17.8% in the past week.

That coincides with an outbreak at Pilgrim’s Pride, which had 93 cases as of Tuesday according to Kerry Waldron, the county’s administrator of health.

Of the county’s 360 cases, there have been 50 hospitalizations according to health department data and 19 deaths. Those cases also include 123 residents or staff of long term care facilities.

As of Wednesday afternoon, there was one positive staff member at the Good Samaritan Center at Advent Christian Village, health department data shows, as well as two positive staff members and five residents, all of whom have been transferred out of the facility, at Surrey Place Care Center. Suwannee Health and Rehabilitation Center has 40 positive residents, 34 of which have been transferred out of the facility.

Waldron also said Tuesday that the county had approximately 158 recoveries using the 14-day quarantine period as a guideline.

There were two additional cases in Lafayette County confirmed Thursday as well, raising its total to 22 known cases.

Those cases involve a 21-year-old male and a 48-year-old female, both connected to an existing case.

Lafayette County has had 472 tests conducted with a 5% positivity rate.

DOH-Lafayette County is hosting a free drive-through testing event Tuesday at the health department, 140 SW Virginia Circle in Mayo, from 9-11 a.m. No signs or symptoms are needed to be tested.

For more information about the testing, call 386-294-1321.

Hamilton County also added two cases Thursday, involving a 49-year-old male and a 30-year-old female. That brings Hamilton’s total of confirmed cases to 317, including 10 hospitalizations.

Total, 2,608 people in Hamilton County have been tested with 12% testing positive.

The state added an additional 5,004 cases in Thursday morning’s announcement, the second straight day the state had more than 5,000 new cases. Total, there were 114,018 known cases in the state as of Thursday morning. That includes 13,775 hospitalizations and 3,327 deaths.