The coronavirus has killed 70 more people across Pennsylvania, state health officials said Wednesday, bringing the statewide total to 309.

Another 1,680 cases of covid-19 were reported across the state, bringing the running total to 16,239, according to the Department of Health. It marked the biggest single-day increase in reported cases.

Secretary of Health Dr. Rachel Levine acknowledged that even though the number of new cases continues to rise, the rate of increase is slowing and no longer represents an exponential increase every few days.

“We have seen a subtle flattening of the curve, which is good news,” Levine said. “We are still seeing, though, significant increases – today it was over 1,600 new cases. But the curve is getting flatter.”

She said it is evidence that mitigation and prevention efforts – the stay-at-home orders, social distancing guidelines, school and business closures – are helping.

“We cannot become complacent,” Levine said, noting that officials believe there will be a surge of critically ill patients, and the mitigation efforts are still needed to make sure the surge is small enough so as not to collapse the state’s health care system.

Among the latest deaths were four more in Allegheny County, which now stands at 10, and the first in Westmoreland County. Westmoreland County now has 183 reported cases of the virus.

Philadelphia reported 29 new deaths, bringing the county’s death toll to 87 and a running case count of 4,456.

The new covid-19 cases marked about an 11.5% increase from the previous day’s total.

As of about 4 p.m., 1,953 covid-19 patients were hospitalized across the state – about 12% of all patients. Of those, 578 were on ventilators.

Nine patients statewide were on an extracorporeal membrane oxygenation (ECMO) machine. The device removes blood from a patient’s body, oxygenates it, then pumps it back into the body. The process allows a person’s heart and lungs to rest and recover.

The Food and Drug Administration earlier this week eased some regulations on when hospitals can use ECMO equipment to treat covid-19 patients.

Statewide, 760 health care workers have been infected, Levine said. There are 831 cases in 157 long-term care facilities across the state.

Beaver County reported four more deaths, bringing the county total to 13, according to the state data.

Fayette and Washington counties both reported two new cases, bringing their respective running totals to 35 and 59. Fayette has seen one death from the virus.

Indiana and Somerset counties remained at 21 and seven, respectively.

Other eastern counties have also been hit particularly hard. Delaware, Lehigh, Luzerne and Montgomery have crested 1,000 reported cases. Bucks County, with a running case count of 756, has seen 22 deaths. In Delaware, 23 people have died out of the 1,034 reported covid-19 cases.

Lehigh and Luzerne have both reported 11 deaths. The numbers in Montgomery County stand at 1,521 cases and 37 deaths.

More than 98,000 people statewide have been tested for the virus, giving it a positive rate of about 16.5%

Positive cases by age:

​0-4: ​< 1%

​5-12: ​< 1%

​13-18: ​1%

​19-24: 7%

​25-49: ​41%

​50-64: ​29%

​65+: 20%

Hospitalizations by age:

0-4: < 1%

​5-12: ​< 1%

​13-18: ​< 1%

​19-24: 1%

​25-49: 19%

​50-64: ​29%

​65+: ​51%

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