Paris, April 20: After consecutive days of decline in the daily fatality count, the health authorities in France sensed a worsening of the situation as their daily death toll spiked on Monday. A total of 547 patients succumbed to death today, confirmed officials in the Emmanuel Macron government, shortly after the worldometer tracker updated the overall fatality tally to 20,265. After Donald Trump, France's Emmanuel Macron Suspects Secrecy in China's Handling of Coronavirus.

The French government was not only pained by the upward movement in the COVID-19 curve, but also faced a symbolic setback in their battle against the pandemic with the overall death count breaching the 20,000-mark.

"Tonight, our country has passed a barrier that is symbolic and particularly painful," top health official Jerome Salomon told reporters. He, however, ended his statement on an optimistic note, claiming that the number of new infections in hospitals across the nation are decreasing.

Update by AFP

France is the fourth-worst affected nation due to coronavirus outbreak across the world. The country has recorded a total of 155,383 cases, out of which over 20,000 have succumbed to death. The nation is only behind to European neighbours Spain and Italy, followed by the United States which has recorded the highest number of infections and fatalities.

Worldwide, the pandemic has infected more than 2,450,000 persons and claimed 168,758 lives so far. Italy, Spain and the United States - the three COVID-19 hotspots in the world - are recording a decline in the number of new infections. President Donald Trump, in the past week, suggested that the world economies need to find a strategy to re-start their business activities in a phased manner amid the pandemic.

(The above story first appeared on LatestLY on Apr 20, 2020 11:34 PM IST. For more news and updates on politics, world, sports, entertainment and lifestyle, log on to our website latestly.com).