ALBANY COUNTY — On Friday, the county’s executive, Daniel McCoy, reported a 200-percent week-to-week jump in vaccination against COVID-19 as the winter surge continues to mount.

At the same time, he reported 234 new cases of the virus in Albany County.

Meanwhile, the governor’s office on Friday reported two virus-related deaths in Albany County as well as a statewide total so far of 178 confirmed cases of the Omicron variant.

On Thursday, the state’s acting health commissioner, Mary Bassett, had described how Omicron, which is highly contagious, could spread exponentially and, even if most cases are mild, could overwhelm hospitals.

Tompkins County, where Cornell University is located, now has the most confirmed cases of the Omicron variant — 117 — surpassing New York City, at 32, which had been dominant.

This past week, Cornell identified more than 900 COVID-19 cases; many of them are Omicron cases in fully vaccinated students. Hence, the university has closed its Ithaca campus.

“While I want to provide reassurance that, to date, we have not seen severe illness in any of our infected students, we do have a role to play in reducing the spread of the disease in the broader community,” wrote President Martha Pollack in a letter to the campus community.

The other counties with Omicron cases include Suffolk with 15, Nassau with six, Oneida with four, Westchester with two, and Broome and Onondaga with one each.

Delta is still the dominant variant statewide. The seven-day positivity rate for the Capital Region is 6.59 percent; statewide, it’s 5.73 percent.

The seven-day average for cases per 100,000 people is 49.0 in Albany County,  58.15 in the Capital Region, and 67.84 statewide.

“As we race to control the latest surge of new COVID infections, especially as we approach the holidays at the end of the month, there has been a huge increase in the number of people going to get their first vaccine doses and booster shots recently,” said McCoy in his Friday release. “Over the last week, there were 5,137 new first doses in Albany County, compared to only 1,660 the week before.”

“When you consider the level of community spread we’re experiencing right now, it’s important to realize how much worse this situation could be without easy access to a vaccine that dramatically reduces your chances of hospitalization death after contracting the virus,” he said.

As of Thursday, 77.9 percent of all Albany County residents have received at least the first dose of the vaccine, and 71.2 percent have been fully vaccinated. The first-dose vaccination rate for county residents who are 18 and older is 87.1 percent.

The county’s seven-day average of new daily positive cases is now up to 176.4. There are now 670 active cases in Albany County, up from 612 on Thursday.

The number of county residents under quarantine increased to 1,316 from 1,265.

There were seven new hospitalizations since Thursday, and there remain 65 county residents hospitalized with the coronavirus. Nine of those hospital patients are now in intensive-care units, up from eight on Thursday.

Albany County’s COVID-19 death toll remains at 457.