The coronavirus death toll in New Jersey increased Wednesday to 5,063 residents, with 95,865 total cases statewide, as officials announced another 314 deaths and 3,551 positive tests even as they continued to say they are seeing hopeful signs of the outbreak stabilizing.

“This does not get any easier,” Gov. Phil Murphy said during his daily press briefing in Trenton. “Yes, we talk about charts and models and trends. And we must. But each and every one of these individuals was an extraordinary and precious life.”

The latest update includes 2,050 deaths at New Jersey’s longterm care facilities, including nursing homes. The facilities account for 11,608 of the state’s total positive tests.

Still, the effort to slow the rate of increase in cases — often referred to as “flattening the curve” — appears to be working, Murphy said.

“We continue to see the curve of new COVID-19 cases remains significantly flat," the governor said. "But again, while we consider this a positive step in our fight, we’re not even close to even consider claiming victory.”

Murphy said his near-lockdown restrictions to slow the outbreak will be needed for some time.

“We must keep our strong social-distancing policies in place," he said. "This will continue to be the case for the next several weeks, at least.”

State officials said there were 7,210 patients in New Jersey hospitalized with the coronavirus or suspected cases as of 10:30 p.m. Tuesday. But the state Department of Health website points out that the data is missing two of New Jersey’s 71 hospitals, making comparisons to previous days incomplete.

Of the known numbers, 1,983 of those patients were critical care and 1,570 on ventilators. And between 10 p.m. Monday and 10 p.m Tuesday, at least 351 new coronavirus patients were hospitalized, while at least 745 were discharged.

“We need these numbers to begin to decrease before we begin the next phase,” Murphy said, adding that hospitalizations will serve as a key indicator in determining when to reopen the state.

State Health Commissioner Judith Persichilli said again that the center of the outbreak appears to have migrated south to Central Jersey, with North Jersey having seen its peak.

A total of 95,794 New Jersey residents have tested negative for COVID-19, officials said.

Still, it’s difficult to get a complete picture of how many people in New Jersey currently have COVID-19 or how quickly it’s spreading. That’s because the state is testing only symptomatic people, officials say testing has been backed up for up to seven days, and the state has not reported significant increases in daily testing.

The county-by-county cases includes:

Bergen County: 13,686 with 876 deaths

Hudson County: 12,039 with 568 deaths

Essex County: 11,387 with 888 deaths

Union County: 10,484 with 481 deaths

Passaic County: 9,392 with 327 deaths

Middlesex County: 9,047 with 369 deaths

Ocean County: 5,234 with 270 deaths

Monmouth County: 5,086 with 251 deaths

Morris County: 4,556 with 309 deaths

Mercer County: 2,845 with 145 deaths

Somerset County: 2,688 with 183 deaths

Camden County: 2,528 with 94 deaths

Burlington County: 1,878 with 68 deaths

Gloucester County: 856 with 29 deaths

Sussex County: 743 with 76 deaths

Warren County: 689 with 55 deaths

Atlantic County: 505 with 24 deaths

Hunterdon County: 434 with 21 deaths

Cumberland County: 382 with 5 deaths

Cape May County: 227 with 16 deaths

Salem County: 134 with 6 deaths

Another 592 cases and 2 deaths are under investigation to determine where the person resides.

The breakdown of cases for which the state has information includes:

49.3% White

22% Black

17.2% Hispanic

5.4% Asian

6.1% Other

CORONAVIRUS RESOURCES: Live map tracker | Newsletter | Homepage

Health officials have said New Jersey could need to administer 20,000 to 30,000 tests a day to appropriately get a handle on the outbreak and reopen the state, dwarfing the 7,000 to 9,000 currently being administered in the state.

Meanwhile, Murphy said the state has bought and received 500 ventilators to help care for critically ill patients. Though officials say ventilator use is leveling off in the state, the governor said the machines could be used if there’s another coronavirus wave in the coming months, as health experts say is probable.

As of Wednesday morning, more than 2.5 million people across the globe tested positive for the virus, according to a running tally by Johns Hopkins University. Of those, more than 178,000 have died and nearly 700,000 have recovered.

NJ Advance Media staff writer Brent Johnson contributed to this report.

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Matt Arco may be reached at marco@njadvancemedia.com.