UF Health Jacksonville is once again filling up with patients battling Covid-19. They are younger — many are in their 20s and 30s, some even in their teens — and they appear to be much sicker than those who flooded hospitals in the early months of the pandemic, de la Paz said.

Sabrina Oetterer, a nurse who started working at UF Health in March, said the change has been “insane.” These days, Oetterer said, it seems as though virtually every new patient coming into the hospital has Covid…

The weekly trends paint an especially bleak picture. Salemi pointed out that in the most recent weekly report from the state Health Department, for example, the state logged more cases in children younger than 12 than it had in its entire population just six weeks ago.

The alarming spike has come as the new and more transmissible delta variant spreads across Florida and while many residents and tourists have effectively returned to pre-pandemic social rituals.