France's reports lowest new coronavirus cases since early March

France's new coronavirus cases fell below the 100 threshold for the first time since March 4 on Wednesday and the number of additional deaths linked to the disease was also sharply down.

According to health ministry figures, there were only 81 new confirmed COVID-19 cases, to 161,348, versus 517 on Tuesday and a daily average of 453 seen over the last week. The number of people who died from coronavirus infection in France rose by 11, to 29,731, compared to 57 a day before, when the weekly data for nursing homes were included, and an weekly average of 18.

France's death toll is the fifth-highest in the world.