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Chinese tourist in France becomes Europe's first coronavirus fatality Chinese tourist in France becomes Europe's first coronavirus fatality
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French health minister confirms death of man from virus that has killed more than 1,500 people around worldFrench health minister confirms death of man from virus that has killed more than 1,500 people around world
Europe has recorded its first coronavirus fatality, as an elderly Chinese tourist in France has died from the disease, the country’s health minister confirmed. An elderly man infected with the coronavirus has died in hospital in France in what is believed to be the first death from the epidemic outside of Asia.
The 80-year-old Chinese man was among 11 confirmed coronavirus cases in France, with his death announced by the French health minister, Agnès Buzyn, on Saturday. The Chinese tourist, aged 80, was visiting Paris when he was taken ill. He had been in hospital for three weeks. The man and his daughter, who is aged 50 and also tested positive for the virus, were being treated at Bichat hospital.
The tourist, who had been treated at the Bichat hospital in northern Paris for the past three weeks, died of a lung infection due to the disease, the minister was told on Friday. Nine other cases of the virus have been recorded in Europe including five Britons, one of them a nine-year-old boy, who were among a group staying in the village of Contamines-Montjoie, a ski resort in the French Alps.
He travelled from the coronavirus-hit Hubei province in China on 16 January and leaves behind a daughter, who also contracted the disease but is now said to be making a good recovery. Of the total of 11 cases confirmed in France, six remain in hospital – including the Chinese patient’s daughter – where their conditions remain stable. French health authorities say four have recovered.
There been more than 66,000 cases of coronavirus worldwide, with the death toll passing 1,500 as health authorities reported an additional 143 fatalities overnight. Agnès Buzyn, the French health minister, said the Chinese man’s condition had worsened in recent days and that he had died on Friday evening.
It is also the first death outside Asia. Only three deaths had previously been reported outside mainland China – in Hong Kong, the Philippines and Japan. On Friday, it emerged that the first case of coronavirus had been confirmed in Africa, with Egypt’s foreign ministry explaining that a “foreigner” had been placed in hospital isolation. The patient, from the Hubei province at the heart of the Chinese epidemic, had a lung infection caused by the Covid-19 virus. He had arrived in France on 16 January and was taken to hospital nine days later and put into strict isolation.
In the UK, which so far has nine confirmed cases of the disease, more than 200 people, including several MPs, have been urgently contacted by health officials after it emerged a delegate at a conference they attended has contracted coronavirus. “His condition declined rapidly and he had been in a critical state for several days,” Buzyn said. “It’s the first death from the coronavirus outside Asia and the first in Europe.”
Two MPs have put themselves in isolation after Public Health England wrote to attendees of the UK Bus Summit in Westminster on 6 February,warning them of the development. She said the man’s daughter should be able to leave hospital soon.
On Saturday, China reported that confirmed cases of the virus had risen to almost 66,500 – more than 1,500 people have died. There have been more than 580 confirmed cases outside mainland China, and three deaths – in the Philippines, Hong Kong and Japan.
Europe has reported 46 cases of the virus that first emerged in central China in December last year. Patients in nine European countries have tested positive for the Covid-19 virus, 16 of them in Germany.