Florida News Archive

Federal transportation officials on Tuesday announced a plan to ease licensure requirements for school bus drivers in an attempt to relieve driver shortages in Florida and other states.

Saying that the “federal government is not going to come through” on a plan to distribute at-home coronavirus tests, Gov. Ron DeSantis on Tuesday said the state is honing its own strategy to send tests to vulnerable Floridians.

HCA Healthcare, which operates 47 hospitals in Florida, has purchased a network of 59 urgent-care centers in the state, the company announced Tuesday.

The number of Florida hospital inpatients with COVID-19 has jumped to nearly 7,000, according to data released Tuesday by the U.S. Department of Health and Human Services.

More than four years after Hurricane Irma plowed through the state, a judge has cleared the way for a class-action lawsuit against Florida Power & Light because of customers’ electricity getting knocked out.

Legislative leaders are monitoring the spike in coronavirus cases across Florida but haven’t made plans to reimpose restrictions on public access that were used during the 2021 session.

Two Republican lawmakers filed proposals Monday that would restrict subjects that could be included in ballot initiatives. Sen. Jason Brodeur, R-Sanford, and Rep. Mike Beltran, R-Lithia, filed the identical measures (SJR 1412 and HJR 1127) for consideration during the legislative session that will start Jan. 11.

A federal judge has blocked a Biden administration rule that would require staff members at Head Start preschool centers in Florida to be vaccinated against COVID-19.

First-time unemployment claims in Florida rolled in last month at a pace similar to the period before the coronavirus pandemic pounded the economy.

In a potentially ominous message for Florida’s cruise-ship industry, the federal Centers for Disease Control and Prevention said Thursday that people should avoid cruise travel “regardless of vaccination status” because of the spread of COVID-19.