Denmark, the country in the world currently with the highest number of new COVID-19 cases relative to its population, on Wednesday broke an all-time high with an additional 23,228 cases in 24 hours.

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However, this record number can largely be explained by the very large number of PCR tests conducted after Christmas, with the rate of positive tests remaining almost stable, at 12.3%, according to data from health authorities.

The previous peak was reached on Monday with 16,164 cases in 24 hours.

The Danish infection means more than one in 60 people have tested positive for the virus in the past week.

The number of people in hospital increased slightly to 675 patients (+9 in 24 hours) including 77 (+6) in intensive care, but progress is still much slower than the increase in the number of cases.

Sixteen additional deaths were recorded in one day. Over the course of one week, the number of deaths increased by 17%, to 89, but it is still far from last winter’s records (249 deaths in a week of January 2021), a gap attributed to the protective effects of vaccines, according to reports. .

At a press conference, the director of the Public Health Authority, Soren Prostrom, invited Danes to celebrate the New Year in “the smallest committee possible”.

Denmark is one of the countries that is testing the most and one of the first countries in Europe to discover cases of mass discovery of the new Omicron variant, which has dominated its territory for a week.

It is also the first time Denmark has exceeded 100,000 registered cases in one week.

According to official data compiled by AFP, Denmark is currently the country with the highest infection rate in the world, with more than 1,700 cases per 100,000 inhabitants in the past seven days.

It is ahead of Malta (1333), followed by Ireland (1312), Iceland (1201) and the United Kingdom (1173).