A second death this week in Butler County has been attributed to COVID-19, according to a state report.

According to the Pennsylvania Department of Health's Friday report, the county's death toll climbed to 17, one more than Thursday's report.

Deaths in the state's reports are reported by the person's permanent residence, even if the death occurs elsewhere in the state or country.

Butler Health System officials confirmed there have not been any deaths at either Butler Memorial or Clarion hospitals since its last update Wednesday.

Since that update, BHS reported an increase of four COVID-19 inpatients. Butler Memorial is treating seven inpatients for COVID-19 with one of those patients in the Intensive Care Unit.

Butler County's last recorded death was reported Wednesday. Before that, the county regularly went long periods without any deaths. The longest period between COVID-19-related deaths was June 17 to July 21.

In addition to the recent death, three new confirmed cases in the county were reported.

Since the beginning of the pandemic, the county has had 652 confirmed cases of COVID-19.

Butler County has been steadily adding cases for the past two weeks, adding 100 confirmed cases to its total over that time frame, which amounts to about seven new cases added per day. Wednesday's addition of 19 was the second highest addition of confirmed cases since the pandemic began.

Although national labs have been overloaded with tests, Nate Wardle, a spokesman for the state Department of Health, said the backups are not the root cause of these spikes.

“The cases we report each day are the lab results reported to us the prior day, so it includes results for specimens collected the day before, and results for specimens that may have been collected 10 days prior,” Wardle said. “However, if a lab has a wait time of 10 days, that should play out each day, and shouldn't lead to any spikes.”

Wardle said the department has also received improvements in national lab backlogs. He said LabCorp reported an average wait time of four days for results, and Quest Diagnostics is also working to increase capacity to cut down on the result time frame.

“Commercial laboratories are working to eliminate the long wait times for test results,” Wardle said.

In a Facebook post Friday, Wolf said that while the state saw an uptick in the overall number of COVID-19 cases, the percent of people testing positive decreased for the second week in a row. He said this is good news.

“This reflects the willingness of Pennsylvanians to take steps to protect themselves and their neighbors,” Wolf said. “Let's continue to wear masks, practice social distancing, and avoid large gatherings.”

The Department of Health's COVID-19 Early Warning Monitoring System Dashboard compiles data from a seven-day period and produces new data looking at the past two weeks.

As of Friday, the state reported a 4 percent positivity rate. Under the same time frame, Butler County has a 3.5 percent positivity rate, although it has been trending upward.

“The mitigation efforts in place now are essential as the new school year approaches and we work to ensure our children can get back to learning,” said state Secretary of Health Dr. Rachel Levine in a news release Friday. “Together, as Pennsylvanians, we each have a part to play in working to ensure that cases of COVID-19 remain low.”