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| Paris, France, September 18, 2020. REUTERS/Gonzalo Fuentes |
France reported 13,498 new confirmed COVID-19 cases over the previous 24 hours, setting another record in daily additional infections since the start of the epidemic.
The new cases pushed the cumulative total to 442,194 as the seven-day moving average of daily new infections rose to more than 9,700, compared with a low of 272 at the end of May, two weeks after the lockdown was lifted.
A faster circulation of the virus and a six-fold increase in testing since the government made it free are the two main reasons for the scale of the increase, epidemiologists have said.
The number of people in France who have died from COVID-19 was up by 26 on Saturday at 31,274, a growth significantly lower than registered the previous day.
Health authorities reported a sudden jump in the countryโs daily death toll from COVID-19 on Friday because of unreported cases in one hospital near Paris.
