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The number of daily cases are going in the right direction, but another spike could be just a few months away. That's according to Dr. Alina Alonso with the Florida Department of Health.
"What we predict is that this will continue to go down a little bit more and then as we get into the holidays, the travel, Thanksgiving, the holidays and New Years that we'll see that spike that we saw in January to go up again. So we can't let our guard down."
She says there were just over 5,500 new COVID cases between September 3rd through the 9th in Palm Beach County, which was down from nearly 9,000 in previous weeks.
She's continuing to stress vaccinations, connecting the decline in cases and hospitalizations to a 12 percent increase in people getting the shots since July.
As of August 29th, 62 percent of county residents ages 12 and older are fully vaccinated, including more than 50 percent of kids ages 12 to 19.
Dr. Alonso also said something that may surprise you.
"There are lots of parents that want to get their kids vaccinated, especially those that are under 12 years of age. Some physicians are going ahead and vaccinating the kids with the Pfizer vaccine off label."
Her message to parents: Don't do that.
"The FDA has warned parents who desperately want to do this not to do it until the studies are completed or if they're part of a controlled study that's going on. We really want them to have that emergency authorization and not just do it on their own until the studies are finished."
We've reached out to Dr. Alonso for more information on this.
The FDA has given Emergency Use Authorization to the Pfizer COVID-19 vaccine for those ages 12 to 17, with full approval for those ages 18 and over. But only children under 12 who are in controlled studies are eligible for the shots.