Covid-19: France to go back into lockdown as virus death toll rises

France will go back into a nationwide lockdown starting this week to try to contain the Covid-19 pandemic that is again threatening to spiral out of control, French President Emmanuel Macron said in an address to the nation on Wednesday.

The new measures echo the eight-week lockdown that France enforced in the spring, when hospitalisations and deaths caused by the Covid-19 epidemic reached a peak.

But unlike the previous lockdown, most schools are to remain open, Macron said.

France on Tuesday reported 523 new deaths from coronavirus over the previous 24 hours, the highest daily toll since April, when the virus was at its most severe.