France reports new record high single-day Covid-19 cases

France has registered a new record for the highest number of single-day Covid-19 cases, with a total of 52,010 people testing positive for the virus in a span of 24 hours, health authorities said.

Sunday's figure came after Saturday's record 45,422 cases, Xinhua news agency quoted the Public Health Agency as saying.

Since the beginning of the pandemic, France has registered a total of 1,138,507 coronavirus.

On October 23, it became the second European country to register more than one million confirmed cases after Spain.

Also on Sunday, the country reported 116 new fatalities, taking the death toll to 34,761, official data revealed.

In addition, 17 per cent of those tested for the virus now have positive results in France, after reaching 16 per cent on Saturday against 15.1 per cent the day before, in comparison to just 4.5 per cent in early September.

The ongoing second wave of the pandemic has forced the French government to impose tougher restrictive measures including curfews in a majority of regions across the country.

More than two-thirds of the French population, or around 46 million people, have been requested to stay home between 9 p.m. and 6 a.m. for six weeks.

On October 24, the National Assembly adopted at the first reading the extension of the state of health emergency until February 16, 2021.

The bill authorizes the executive to introduce restrictions to face a "period which will be long and difficult", warned Health Minister Olivier Veran.

The toll will "grow heavier in the coming days and weeks, whatever we do" due to the dynamics of the epidemic, he added.

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