The French government has imposed a month-long lockdown on Paris and parts of northern France after a faltering vaccine rollout and spread of highly contagious coronavirus variants forced the president, Emmanuel Macron, to shift course, The Guardian reports.
Since late January, when he defied the calls of scientists and some in his government to lock down the country, Macron has said he would do whatever was needed to keep the euro zone’s second-largest economy as open as possible. However, this week he ran out of options just as France and other European countries briefly suspended the use of the Oxford/AstraZenca vaccine.
The prime minister, Jean Castex, said on Thursday that France was in the grip of a third wave, with the virulent variant first detected in Britain now accounting for about 75% of cases. Intensive care wards are under severe strain, notably in Paris, where the incidence rate surpasses 400 infections in every 100,000 inhabitants. “The epidemic is getting worse. Our responsibility now is not to let it escape our control,” Castex told a news conference.
France reported 35,000 new cases on Thursday, and there were more Covid patients in intensive care in Paris than at the peak of the second wave.
