A study led by the Pasteur Institute has found that just 4.4% of the French population - or 2.8 million people - have been infected by the novel coronavirus, much higher than the official count of cases but too low to achieve so-called "herd immunity".
In a study published in the journal Science, researchers say the infection rate in the worst-hit parts of France - the eastern part of the country and the Paris region - is between 9% and 10% on average. "Around 65% of the population should be immune if we want to control the pandemic by the sole means of immunity", the study says.
Herd immunity refers to a situation where enough people in a population have immunity to an infection to be able to effectively stop that disease from