While much of Europe is worried about the Omicron variant and imposes new restrictions, in France, this Friday, health authorities count a total of 11,103 patients hospitalized due to a Covid-19 infection.
In hospitals, there were 10,790 patients on Thursday, and 9,181 last Friday, according to Public Health France.
Of the 11,103 hospitalized patients, 2,058 patients are treated in critical care.
They were 1,934 Thursday, and 1,563 last Friday.
Public Health France also recorded 114 new deaths linked to Covid-19, bringing the total of deaths in France to at least 119,400.
The threat of the Omicron variant
An ever-increasing number of countries have reported cases of local transmission of the Omicron variant of the coronavirus, about which the WHO has "no information" regarding possible deaths.
The UN agency, which considers the new variant worrying, considers "high" the "probability that Omicron spreads worldwide", even if many unknowns remain.
Omicron is now present on all continents, detected by around thirty countries.
The Stockholm-based European Center for Disease Prevention and Control (ECDC) estimated Thursday that Omicron "could cause more than half of infections caused by the SARS-CoV-2 virus in the European Union by the next few months ”.
Read alsoCovid-19: nine cases of the Omicron variant detected in France in five regions
Especially since, according to a study by South African scientists, the risk of catching Covid-19 again is three times greater with the Omicron variant than with the Beta and Delta variants.
The Covid-19 has killed at least 5,233,111 people around the world and infected nearly 265 million people since the end of 2019, according to an AFP count.
