Over 17,000 people have now died in France from Covid-19, a top health official said on Wednesday, but the total number currently hospitalised has fallen for the first time since the epidemic began, AFP reports.

A total of 17,167 people are now confirmed to have died in France in hospitals and nursing homes, Jerome Salomon told reporters, compared with a total toll of 15,729 the day earlier.

But he said the difference between the two figures did not represent a daily toll due to the delayed collation of data from the Easter weekend.

A medical staff member pushes a  woman suspected of being infected with Covid-19, into a Covid-19 unit at the Timone Hospital in Marseille, southeastern France, on April 15, 2020, on the 30th day of a lockdown in France aimed at curbing the spread of the pandemic. — AFP
A medical staff member pushes a woman suspected of being infected with Covid-19, into a Covid-19 unit at the Timone Hospital in Marseille, southeastern France, on April 15, 2020, on the 30th day of a lockdown in France aimed at curbing the spread of the pandemic. — AFP

In better news, he said there were currently 513 fewer coronavirus patients in hospital than the day before.

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