French COVID-19 cases rising at unprecedented rate - health minister

Published July 20, 2021 10:54pm

People walk in the streets of Paris, some without protective face masks, as masks are no longer required outdoors, amid the coronavirus disease (COVID-19) pandemic, in France. FILE PHOTO

PARIS, France - French Health Minister Olivier Veran said Tuesday that new COVID-19 infections were increasing at an unprecedented rate due to the Delta variant after cases hit 18,000 in the last 24 hours.

Referring to the latest figures while speaking in parliament, he said: "That means we have an increase in the spread of the virus of around 150 percent in the last week: we've never seen that, neither with Covid (the original form), nor the British variant, nor the South African or the Brazilian one." -- Agence France-Presse

Tags: france, COVID-19, COVID vaccine