PARIS (Reuters) -Pressure on French hospitals eased further on Thursday as the number of people in intensive care with COVID-19 fell by 93 to 3,769 while the overall number of patients eased by nearly 600 to 20,750.
The number of new deaths from COVID-19 in hospitals fell to 133 from 153 on Wednesday, bringing total deaths to 81,966.
Health Ministry data also showed that the number of new COVID-19 cases had been revised down on Thursday because some people had earlier been counted twice.
As a result, Thursday’s data showed an unusual decline of 348,846 in new cases over 24 hours, bringing the total tally since the start of the epidemic to 5.68 million cases.
On Wednesday, France reopened outdoor cafe terraces, museums and shops selling non-essential goods.
France will make COVID-19 vaccinations available to everyone over 18 from May 31, two weeks earlier than the initially planned date of June 15, Prime Minister Jean Castex said.
(Reporting by GV De Clercq, additional reporting Nicolas Delame, Editing by Dominique Vidalon, Kirsten Donovan and Giles Elgood)
