Covid-19: more than 500,000 deaths in the EU, but improvement in the most affected countries

More than 500,000 deaths officially linked to Covid-19 have been recorded since the start of the pandemic in the European Union, where the situation however seems to be improving in a number of countries, according to a count made by AFP from balance sheets provided by the authorities.

Read also: Covid-19: Europe tightens the screw again in the face of variants

The symbolic threshold of 500,000 deaths was crossed Tuesday evening in the European Union.

On Wednesday February 10 at 12 p.m. GMT, the EU had a total of 501,531 deaths for 20,548,666 reported cases.

The EU has some of the countries most affected by the epidemic in the world.

But in recent days, the trend seems to be improving.

During the week of February 3 to 9, 103,250 new cases of Covid-19 were recorded daily on average in the 27 countries of the block, or 16% less than over the previous seven days.

The number of deaths amounted to 3,137 recorded each day on average (-7%).

Among the European countries most affected by the pandemic, Spain is the one that has posted the largest decrease in new cases recorded daily on average over the last seven days (21,945, down 31%).

This figure rises to 9,120 for Germany (-20%), 19,348 for France (-7%) and 2,795 for Sweden (-4%).

In Italy, the situation remains stable with 12,012 cases recorded per day on average.

In terms of deaths, Sweden recorded a sharp decrease with 53 deaths per day on average, 34% less than the previous week.

In Germany, this figure rose to 596 (-16%), in Italy to 380 (-9%) and in France to 416 (-7%).

Spain, on the other hand, saw this figure increase slightly (465, + 8%).

Outside the EU, the United Kingdom has seen the average number, over seven days, of its cases recorded daily fall by 27% to 17,075.

The average number of deaths there fell by 26% to 834 over the same period.

As of February 10 at 12 p.m. GMT, the United Kingdom, the fifth most affected country in the world in absolute number of deaths, had a total of 113,850 deaths linked to Covid-19 for 3,972,148 positive cases detected, France 80,147 deaths for 3,360. 235 cases, Spain 63,061 for 3,005,487, Italy 92,002 for 2,655,319, Germany 62,969 for 2,299,996, and Sweden 12,188 for 596,174.

On the larger scale of the Europe region, comprising 52 countries and territories, 34,902,124 cases of Covid-19 were recorded as of February 10.

With 785,106 people deceased from Covid-19, the region is the most damaged in the world, ahead of Latin America and the Caribbean (624,952) and the United States / Canada (489,091).

During the week of February 3 to 9, 157,255 new cases of Covid-19 were recorded daily on average in the Europe region, a figure down 15% compared to the previous week.

The number of deaths has also decreased, with 4,832 deaths recorded per day on average (-11%) over the period.