Largest Single-Day Coronavirus Increase Pushes Total Past 300

New coronavirus cases in Massachusetts saw their largest single-day jump, soaring past 300 positive tests overall the same day Gov. Charlie Baker expected an "enormous increase" in testing.

The state's Public Department of Health on Thursday announced 328 cases of COVID-19, an increase of 72 from Wednesday's numbers. Forty-three of those cases so far have required hospitalization.

Every county in Massachusetts now has a positive case of COVID-19. Middlesex County has the most cases with 119, while Suffolk jumped to 72 cases and Norfolk County 52 cases.

The increase in cases come as testing becomes more available. Officials have long expected a drastic increase in cases as testing expands.

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Baker said earlier Thursday the state's goal is conducting at least 3,500 tests per day. The state had conducted only 2,208 as of the afternoon.

Quest Diagnostics CEO Steve Rusckowski said he hopes his company can test between 2,000-3,000 people in Massachusetts, while upping national testing in its Marlborough lab to 20,000.

"We believe that over the course of the next several days and weeks there will be an enormous increase in the amount of testing that takes place on a daily basis here in the commonwealth of Massachusetts," Baker said. "It can't happen fast enough but I do believe that with the pivots and the adjustments that are being made by organizations like Quest here in Marlborough and by many of our hospital partners and by the state lab and other organizations, we will get to the point where we're doing the amount of testing every day that we believe that we need to be doing."

The lack of testing is a large part of the reason officials expect the number of coronavirus cases in the U.S., including the 256 in Massachusetts as of Wednesday, to increase dramatically.

The Centers for Disease Control was initially the only body testing for coronavirus, but states and subsequently commercial labs have received permission

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State House News Service contributed to this report