Pennsylvania should see its surge in coronavirus cases next week, Gov. Tom Wolf said Friday.

Wolf said earlier this week that the state is no longer seeing exponential daily growth, but a high number of cases are still being reported. The state Health Department reported 1,751 new cases as of 12:01 a.m,. bringing the statewide total to nearly 20,000.

The governor said state officials are projecting the long-awaited surge of patients is expected next week.

The key with the surge, Wolf said, as it relates to the future of stay-at-home and business shutdown orders, is to see whether or not hospitals can handle it. He also reiterated the need for all Pennsylvanians to adhere to the orders to help slow the COVID-19 spread.

“I want to address the uncertainty of when this is going to end, and again, it’s sort of a moving target and depends how we do,” Wolf said during a conference call with reporters.

“If the surge occurs next week as we suspect it will, and it’s within the range of the capacity of our health care system, that’s going to allow us to shut this shutdown down fast.”

But Wolf didn’t specify what he meant by “fast.”

Currently, non-life sustaining businesses are closed indefinitely and the statewide stay-at-home order is in place through at least April 30. K-12 schools, on the other hand, saw their physical locations shuttered for the rest of the school year on Thursday, and all learning will now take place online.

Wolf did not cite a source regarding his belief that the surge is on the horizon.

Earlier this week, Health Secretary Dr. Rachel Levine said the stay-at-home order and other restrictions could be relaxed gradually. She said some counties may be lifted from the order initially as opposed to lifting the order statewide.

In her briefing Friday, Levine noted a well-known model from the University of Washington suggests some areas could peak in the next week. But she also said it’s not certain and that some areas in the state would peak at different times.

At least one expert, UMPC Pinnacle chief medical officer Dr. James Raczek, has told PennLive that he believes the peak is still weeks away.

“The key thing is, all of us really need to stay home,” Wolf said. "In a perfect world we’d have a vaccine, and plenty of tests, and plenty of equipment. In a perfect world, we wouldn’t have this virus, but we’re not in a perfect world, so we’re making a lot of decisions with, what’s the least bad decision? And the least bad thing we can do is stay home.

“We’re all responsible to each other in making this happen. To the extent that we’re able to practice the daily routine things that will keep us from connecting with each other, the faster we’re going to shut down this virus and the faster we can get through this first phase of a hard stop. We’re all on the front lines, and to the extent we all continue to do what we’ve been doing, we can get through this. It was true when this thing started, and it’s still true.”