While eight new departments extended their curfew on Saturday, the epidemic trend continues to cause concern.
This Saturday, 20,177 new positive tests were identified, against 19,814 the day before.
There are also 171 new deaths in hospital against 157 last Saturday.
This brings the number of deaths linked to Covid-19 to at least 67,599, according to the authorities, including 46,957 in hospitals.
It should be noted that the death data reported on weekends are generally lower than on weekdays due to delays in registration.
At the hospital, there are 22,440 hospitalized patients this Saturday, including 2,600 in intensive care, against 24,458 hospitalized and 2,632 serious cases seven days ago.
At this level too, the indicators suggest that France has been on an epidemic plateau since the beginning of December.
Important point: we still have to wait ten days to clearly measure the impact on the epidemic of the end-of-year gatherings.
This is a major point of concern.
The authorities also remain extremely vigilant in the face of the development of the British and South African variants.
For example, a cluster bringing together 21 cases has just been detected in the Bouches-du-Rhône.