REVISES HEADLINE, DECK, ADDS NEW DETAILS
By Cindi Cook
PARIS (AA) - The death toll in France from the novel coronavirus climbed to 674 Sunday with the country still battling the disease in the sixth day of a nationwide lockdown.
The number of deaths is up 154 from yesterday's total with the number of reported cases now 16,018.
Worldwide, the number of dead stands at 14,450, with 331,273 confirmed cases reported.
Emmanuelle Wargon, France's Secretary of State to the Minister for the Ecological and Solidarity Transition, announced Sunday on Twitter that she has tested positive for the virus.
Wargon, the third member of parliament to contract COVID-19, said she has only mild symptoms and is staying confined and resting.
Meanwhile, the first medical doctor in France has died from the disease -- Jean-Jacques Razafindranazy, 67, an emergency room physician at Compiegne Hospital in Oise, one of the northern regions of the country hit hard by the virus. Razafindranazy succumbed to the coronavirus on Saturday at Lille University Hospital, where he had been transferred.
Minister of Health Olivier Veran announced the death during a Sunday press conference.
"Last night, I learned of the death of the doctor. I want to share in the pain of the caregivers. They pay a very heavy price," said Veran.
Razafindranazy, an orthopedist, had come out of retirement to lend a hand to the overwhelmed medical community in the midst of the epidemic. A minute of silence will be observed tomorrow at noon at Compiegne Hospital in his honor.
The novel coronavirus, officially known as COVID-19, first emerged in Wuhan, China last December and has spread to at least 169 countries and regions, according to data compiled by the U.S.-based Johns Hopkins University.
The World Health Organization has declared the outbreak a pandemic.