Louisiana is setting records for new COVID-19 diagnoses, and the state’s omicron variant surge is just beginning, Gov. John Bel Edwards said Thursday.

Thursday’s 24-hour total of 12,467 new cases was more than a third above Wednesday’s 9,378, Edwards said.

He said the U.S. Centers for Disease Control and Prevention said Wednesday’s figure was itself a state record, topping 7,548 set in August. Edwards says the number of people hospitalized with the virus has risen 268 percent since Dec. 17, to 762.

The governor said he would not mandate masks unless such an order is needed to keep hospitals from being overwhelmed. But he said people should heed masking recommendations from both the CDC and the state Department of Health.

Wearing a mask is a minor inconvenience “compared to being in a hospital struggling to get oxygen or watching a loved one struggling to get oxygen,” he said.