The number of new confirmed and probable cases of the coronavirus in Illinois topped 15,000 for the first time Friday, setting a record for the fourth straight day.

The 15,415 cases state public health officials reported was 2,713 more than the previous record set Thursday. Over the past week, the state is averaging 12,345 cases of COVID-19 per day.

The staggering number comes after Gov. J.B. Pritzker, Chicago Mayor Lori Lightfoot and Cook County public health officials all have urged residents to stay home except for essential trips, such as grocery shopping or going to the pharmacy.

Pritzker warned Thursday that the state could be headed for another stay-at-home order if the current surge of the virus doesn’t come under control.

State health officials also reported 27 more fatalities Friday, bringing the statewide death toll to 10,504 since the pandemic began. While there were fewer deaths reported Friday than in recent days, the state has averaged 61 deaths per day over the past week, up from 41 at the beginning of the month.

In all, there have been 551,957 known cases of COVID-19 in Illinois, according to state health officials.

For the week ending Thursday, the average number of cases as a share of total tests was 13.2%, up from 8.1% at the beginning of the month and 3.4% at the beginning of October.

Hospitalizations, which are a key indicator of how the virus is spreading, also continue to surge. As of Thursday night, 5,362 people were in the hospital with COVID-19, 990 of them in intensive care and 488 on ventilators. Over the past three days, there have been more coronavirus patients in the hospital each day than at any time during the first wave in the spring.

The state on Friday updated the data it posts related to contact tracing, which involves reaching out to people diagnosed with COVID-19, urging them to isolate and asking them where they’ve been and whom they’ve seen during the two weeks before their positive test so those people can be asked to quarantine.

The data — covering the period from Aug. 1 to Nov. 7 — shows that the state is short of its goal of launching contact tracing for 90% of cases, although some regions came very close. Others appear nowhere near that target. For example, in the 20 counties in far southern Illinois, tracers reached out to 89% of sick people, while in suburban Cook County, the figure was 17%, according to the state.

The data also shows outbreak locations, defined as places where there were five or more cases within 14 days, and exposure locations, or places that people with the disease reported going in the 14 days before diagnosis.

The top three categories of outbreak locations over the past 30 days were day care operations, workplaces and factories, which have their own classification. The top three exposure locations were schools, businesses including retail operations and then restaurants and bars, which share a classification.

Pritzker’s shutdown of indoor service at restaurants and bars has become a matter of fierce debate, with Pritzker saying it’s just not safe right now and restaurateurs contending he can’t prove that.

Finally, there’s also data on outbreaks and exposures at schools, showing a smattering of outbreaks in six counties including McHenry, and exposures across central and northern Illinois, with many in Chicago and its suburbs.