More than 10,500 cases of coronavirus were reported in France on Saturday, a new daily record. The previous record of 9,843 injuries was set just two days ago.
The grim number – 10, 561 – serves to underscore the re-emergence of the virus in FranceCountries across the continent are also struggling with an increasing number of cases and more hospitalizations.
French health authorities reported that 772 groups had been investigated, an increase of 86 in the past 24 hours.
Over the past week, 2,432 people have been hospitalized due to the virus, of whom 417 are in intensive care.
The death toll in hospitals and nursing homes increased by 17 to 30,910 over the past day.
In response to the record increase in new cases on Thursday, the French government introduced additional measures to avoid a return to the general lockdown that was imposed earlier in the year.
first Minister Jan Castex It promised steps to speed up testing and tighten local measures in high-infection areas.
Test capacity in France rose last week to 1 million a week, compared to a fraction of that at the start of the epidemic. It has conducted fewer than 6 million tests in total since the virus first appeared.
Castex, who emerged from self-isolation on Saturday after coming into contact with a person infected with the virus, said that the epidemic in France “is clearly worsening.”
“For the first time in several weeks, we are seeing a significant increase in the number of people in hospitals,” Mr. Castex said on Friday.
And in MarseilleDoctors sounded the alarm, which emerged as a hotspot, after all of the 70 intensive care beds in the city and surrounding Bouches-du-Rhône were occupied on Tuesday.
The number of ICU virus patients in the region has doubled in the past 10 days and now exceeds 100.
District hospitals are reinvigorating the emergency measures that were put in place when the epidemic first broke out, and after space ran out I had to put people in units for non-virus patients instead.
“In March, April and May, we were able to absorb the pandemic wave by abandoning care activities in other hospitals, and today what is at stake is the ability to continue treating every other patient while being able to confront the epidemic,” according to To La Veran Military Training Hospital the chief physician told the Associated Press, describing it as a battle on two fronts.
On the whole, the French authorities say they are better prepared this time than they were in March, when injuries rose very quickly and the army intervened to transport patients and build the first field hospital in France in peacetime.
The rise in the number of cases in France is subject to comparisons across the channel, as the UK is seeing daily infections at a level not seen since May.
England’s chief medical officer, Chris Whitty, provided France as an example that would not follow as he provided further justification for Boris Johnson’s new restrictions on the “rule of six”.
Chris Whitty warns that coronavirus cases are increasing “rapidly” among young people
With the help of graphs showing case numbers in the UK, France, Spain and Belgium, Professor Wite said: “What you can see is that we are following a very similar pattern to that of France, and in France this rate has continued to rise and the same is true in Spain.
“But in Belgium the same kind of chart was happening but then they took decisive action at which point the prices stabilized and started to fall.
“It’s a clear indication that if you act quickly and decisively when these changes happen, there is a good chance that prices will be brought down again under control.”
His comments were echoed by the former chief scientific advisor, Sir Mark Walport, who warned that the UK was “on the verge of losing control” over the virus.
He told BBC Radio 4: “You just have to look across the channel to see what is happening in France, and what is happening in Spain.” Today a program:
He added: “The short answer is the only way to stop the spread of this infection is to reduce the number of people we all deal with, which reduces the risk.
“It’s a very good balancing act. It’s very important to get young people back to school, people to university, but that means we’ll have to curb our contacts in other areas.”
The professor said he “definitely” still works from home, adding, “Where people can work from home, there is a very strong argument that they should do so.”
Additional reporting by agencies
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