INTERNATIONAL: France reaches peak of the epidemic, a very high peak with 50,000 infections a day now. It has reached the top of a fifth wave of Covid-19 infections, Health Minister Olivier Veran has said on Tuesday, adding that it remained to be seen if the wave would subside or stay at a plateau.

It's the highest rate the country has ever seen since the start of the pandemic. The rate of infection has increased in the past 15 days, the load in the intensive care units and the number of hospitalisations will continue to increase in the next two weeks and that it is weighing on the country’s hospitals that are already very mobilised. The French Health Minister says that vaccination protects.

The seven-day moving average of daily new cases, which evens out reporting irregularities, stood on Monday at a more than one year high of 48,879. At 14,527, the current number of people hospitalised for COVID-19 has reached a peak since June 5.

France has also reported on Monday that a further 231 people had died from the disease in hospitals in the last 24 hours, while the number of COVID patients in intensive care units (ICUs) had risen by 150 to stand at 2,752.