French Prime Minister Emmanuel Macron tests positive of COVID-19

French President Emmanuel Macron has tested positive for COVID-19, the French Presidency announced on Thursday; however, it was not clear at this point where he had caught the virus.

“The President of the Republic has been diagnosed positive for COVID-19 today,” his office announced in a statement. “This examination was made following a PCR test conducted at the appearing of the initial symptoms.”

The presidency announced he would quarantine for the next seven days and would proceed to run the nation remotely. A spokeswoman stated that all his trips had been suspended, including an upcoming visit to Lebanon on December 22.

They added he was attempting to evaluate where he could have caught the virus.

Macron was at a European Council heads of state meeting for two days on December 10-11. Many people have come in contact with the French President in the last few days, and analysis are undergoing to find the source of infection.

Prime Minister Jean Castex will also self-quarantine after getting into contact with Macron over the last few days, stated Gerard Larcher, head of the Senate, the upper house of the French parliament.

It has been announced that Prime Minister Jean Castex is not showing any virus related symptoms, but as a precaution, he would not be attending senate on Thursday which was planned to outline his government’s vaccine strategy to battle COVID, his office stated in a declaration.

Macron is the latest world leader to become contaminated with COVID. United Kingdom Prime Minister Boris Johnson and United States President Donald Trump have also beaten the coronavirus.

In France, since the start of the coronavirus pandemic, over 2.4 million people have had coronavirus so far and around 59,472 have died with the virus.

By analysing, in Italy, Europe’s worst-hit country in terms of mortality rate and 66,537 have died, followed strictly by the United Kingdom, with 65,618.