France continued to see a rise in Covid-19 cases as it recorded 501,635 new cases on Tuesday. The numbers were the first time since the onset of the pandemic that the nation recorded as many cases. Cases in France have not ebbed as compared to its other nations like the UK which saw cases fall. France was recording more than 300,000 daily cases per week on an average. This number rose to 360,000 daily cases per week on an average.
The number of hospitalizations also rose to 20,000, the highest tally since November 2020, but the number of patients in intensive care was less than 3,800, according to a report by AFP. The death toll in France also rose to 129,489 as 364 people died between Monday and Tuesday.
France in a bid to arrest the spread of Covid-19 introduced the vaccine pass earlier on Monday. The vaccine pass will be required to enter bars, restaurants, trains and planes. For leisure activities, work events and long-distance travel merely producing a negative test report will not be enough. France is also looking forward to removing most Covid-19 restrictions next week like the UK and the Netherlands, with the latter doing so amid a high number of cases.
The French response to the current wave of Covid-19 cases fuelled by the Omicron variant will play an important role in the upcoming elections in April. French president Emmanuel Macron is yet to announce his candidacy for the elections but it is expected that he will contest them.
France is also investigating the role of BA.2 – the sub-lineage of the Omicron variant which has been found in several nations across all continents. Experts told French news agency France24 that the initial reports suggest BA.2 infectivity is not very different from BA.1 or the Omicron variant. However, French health experts are keeping an eye on developments in Denmark where the cases rose after falling initially.
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