Pennsylvania reported its single biggest daily death toll during the coronavirus pandemic on Sunday, but the new numbers don’t simply reflect what happened on Saturday.

Instead, Department of Health Secretary Dr. Rachel Levine said that the majority of the 276 newly-reported deaths did not happen overnight. The jump, she said, is partially due to the fact that electronic and probable-cause deaths are now being factored into the total.

What that means is, the department reconciled its electronic submissions, such as those from hospitals and longterm care homes, among other places, with data provided by the state’s Vital Records department.

According to Department of Health, eight of the deaths occurred more than two weeks ago, 138 of the deaths occurred two weeks ago, and 130 of the deaths occurred in the last week.

“We understand how important accurate data is to make informed decisions about our path forward for this global pandemic,” Levine said during a news conference. "As we collect data, we are also verifying its accuracy. Some deaths are reported to us with several causes of death with COVID-19 listed as maybe the fourth or fifth cause of death, and our epidemiologists then investigate whether or not that person has previously tested positive for COVID-19.

“This work takes time. And so today, the increase in deaths is a culmination of that data validating effort.”

Pa. is reporting a total of 32,284 confirmed positive coronavirus cases and 1,112 deaths after 1,215 and 276 were added to those counts, respectively, as of 12:01 a.m. Sunday.

Levine stressed that, despite the increase, social distancing and other mitigation efforts continue to be effective when it comes to flattening the coronavirus curve.

“We have a number of different data systems,” Levine said. "We have data systems called NEDSS, and that’s the information that we get from hospitals, that we get from healthcare systems, that we get from county/municipal health departments, and, and we get from long term care living facilities and those cases and deaths are put into that system.

“Of course, we also have our vital records department, which tracks births and deaths, and so there are cases that might be diagnosed by a coroner or other ways where that data comes into that system. Today, we reconciled those systems which showed in the increase we’re reporting today.”

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