Florida beach swamped by huge crowds of people as sunshine state hits record number of new cases

Florida has been the centre of several viral moments that have summed up America’s haphazard coronavirus response.

Remember those spring breakers who refused to let coronavirus stop them from partying and then were diagnosed with Covid-19 the next week?

Well now, for some reason, beaches and parks have been re-opened in some parts of Florida... on the same day the state clocked a record number of coronavirus cases.

Huge crowds were seen cheering and rushing the beach in Jacksonville as police removed the barriers on Friday 16 April.

Getty

Aerial photos show hundreds of people packing into the beach, many without masks.

CNN reports that one beach-goer said:

We all live on it, so it has been torture looking at it and not being able to be out here.

Mayor Lenny Curry reportedly said that reopening the beach was part of the pathway back to “normal life”. He made the decision to re-open the beach after Trump ally governor Ron DeSantis gave the green light for some municipalities to begin reopening beaches.

It’s unclear why now was the time to re-open the beach, seeing as Florida announced 1,400 new cases on Friday, the highest 24-hour toll since the pandemic began.