New cases of coronavirus are surging across New Jersey as the state reaches what Gov. Phil Murphy described as a “sobering” milestone: Cases in the state have averaged over 1,000 a day for the past week. 

New Jersey is now on the cusp of heading into the pandemic’s fall surge that experts long predicted would arrive in the colder months — and one other hard hit countries like Italy are already experiencing. 

“The question I think that we don't have answers for is whether or not the second wave will be higher than the first one,” said Stephanie Silvera, an epidemiologist and public health professor at Montclair State University. “We're heading into that sort of high risk for community spread designation. We don't have this contained anymore.” 

What started with isolated outbreaks on college campuses and among the Orthodox Jewish community in Lakewood over the High Holidays, has now snowballed into a statewide crisis, fueled by what state officials say is private indoor gatherings across all of New Jersey’s 21 counties.