12 2GM Friday August 28 2020 | the times
News
Facemasks are to become compulsory
outdoors in Paris as part of efforts to
halt an “undeniable resurgence” in
coronavirus infections across France.
Jean Castex, the prime minister, said
that it was necessary because the dis-
ease was accelerating in the capital as
people returned from holidays.
Daily cases in France passed 5,
on Wednesday for the first time since
May. The incidence rate nationally has
risen to 39 positive tests per 100,
people over the previous week and it is
increasing in all age groups. In Paris
and Marseilles the rate is well above 50.
Yesterday Germany urged its citizens
not to travel to coronavirus “risk zones”,
such as Paris, Brussels and nearly all of
Spain unless the journey was absolutely
necessary. “This is new: we will appeal
to the public to refrain from going to
risk zones wherever possible,” Angela
Merkel, the chancellor, said.
All arrivals from risk zones are
obliged to take a free coronavirus test
upon entering Germany. From
October they will be ordered to go into
quarantine, which will only be lifted if
they test negative after a minimum of
five days.
Belgium has listed Paris as a “red
zone”, meaning that people returning
from the area are subject to a mandato-
ry test and a fortnight’s quarantine.
Germany and Belgium have identi-
fied holidaymakers returning from
areas with high infection rates as one of
the biggest factors behind the
resurgence of Covid-19. Belgium said
that a fifth of new infections this month
Paris makes masks
outside mandatory
to halt resurgence
Charles Bremner Paris
Bruno Waterfield Brussels
Oliver Moody Berlin
were people coming back from holiday.
Professor Steven Van Gucht, the virolo-
gist leading Belgium’s response to the
virus, said: “We see a similar picture in
other countries. In Italy and Germany
this is the case among one in three of
those infected. In the Netherlands the
figure is 24 per cent. Travel remains a
risk factor and it is very important that
we respect the rules on testing and
quarantine.”
At present masks are required only in
central crowded areas outdoors in
Paris, while they are compulsory in all
public indoor spaces nationally includ-
ing shops and public transport. Marseil-
les and Bordeaux have also imposed
mask wearing outdoors.
The Paris mask rule starts at 8am to-
day and covers the city and the ring of
its nearest suburbs in the départements
of Seine-Saint-Denis, Hauts-de-Seine
and Val-de-Marne.
Paris had already been declared an
active “red zone”. Mr Castex added 19
more départements to a map with “red”
zones of active virus circulation, mean-
ing that 21 of the 94 administrative
areas are now red.
More than 800 patients are being ad-
mitted to hospital with Covid-19 every
week in France, up from 500 six weeks
ago, the prime minister said. He
appealed to the French to act more re-
sponsibly and take seriously preventa-
tive measures including hand washing,
mask wearing and social distancing.
“The epidemic is gaining ground and
now is the time to intervene,” he said.
“[France] must do everything to avoid a
new lockdown”.
Mr Castex, 55, who was appointed by
President Macron last month in suc-
cession to Édouard Philippe, has spentthe week mixing warnings with reas-
surance as France prepares for next
week’s rentrée. Polls are showing high
public anxiety with the annual return
to work and school after the long sum-
mer holidays that followed the easing of
the early spring lockdown. He said that
“living with the virus” must become the
new normal and everyone should re-
sume their work and education.
A symbol of normality is the start of
the Tour de France in Nice tomorrow.
The three-week race was delayed from
its traditional early July start but the
traditional crowds are expected to line
its route. Spectators will be limited at
the daily finish lines and all have been
asked to wear masks and spread out.
Jean-Michel Blanquer, the education
minister, said that there was no reason
to change plans for the country’s
2.9 million school pupils to return to
normal classes next Tuesday. All aged
11 and upwards must wear masks, even
in the playground. “All children should
return to school,” Mr Blanquer added.
The Paris region, one of the world’s
leading tourist destinations, has suf-
fered huge damage from the absence of
visitors this year, Valérie Pécresse, pres-
ident of the regional council, said yes-
terday.
“For the past four years, we had been
announcing record number of visitors.
So it is with great sadness that we have
seen the pandemic shatter an extreme-
ly dynamic and flourishing sector,” she
said.
Fourteen million visitors stayed away
in the first six months of the year
compared with ordinary years, she said.
That led to a €6 billion drop in income
to €4 billion over the period. Visits by
foreign tourists declined by 70 per cent.Children as young as six will be
required to wear masks during lessons
when Spain’s schools reopen next
month as part of a desperate attempt by
the government to stem a second wave
of coronavirus cases.
Pupils and teachers will have their
temperatures taken before entering the
school building each morning and
children would be required to wash
their hands “frequently and rigor-
ously”, which the government later
clarified as amounting to at least five
times a day.
Those as young as three will have to
wear masks on the way to nursery.
Spaniards endured one of the tough-
est lockdown regimes this spring, with
children banned from leaving their
homes for six weeks.
Since late May, when the restrictions
were eased, all children aged six and
over have been required to wear masks
in public.
Any hopes that pupils would be at
least able to remove masks in the class-
room when schools go back next
month evaporated yesterday when the
government’s health and education
ministers, together with Spain’s 17
regional authorities, agreed on a
Spanish schools take tough action
battery of strict countrywide Covid-
measures for primary and secondary
schools.
“We want the highest possible num-
ber of students back in the classrooms,
and a safe return to those classrooms,”
Isabel Celaá, the education minister,
said as she confirmed that face-to-face
teaching would take priority over the
system of distance learning that operat-
ed during the lockdown.
The new rules require that a distance
of 1.5 metres between classmates be
kept.
Classrooms will be ventilated
between each lesson for between 10 and
15 minutes and children will have to
keep to the same seat in school can-
teens and on buses. Contact between
different classes, each of which will
form a separate bubble, will be kept to a
minimum.
Ms Celaá told parents who were still
reticent about their children returning
to school in such conditions that “it’s an
obligation, they have to go to class.
Families know that their children have
a right to education.”
Even after yesterday’s announce-
ment, two key areas — teacher-pupil
ratios and whether coronavirus tests
will be carried out on students — are to
remain a devolved issue, with each ofthe 17 semi-autonomous regions decid-
ing on their own regimes.
Parental concern has been heighten-
ed by an increase in coronavirus cases
to more than 400,000 nationally, the
highest total in western Europe.
Younger people have been blamed
for helping to boost the number of cases
by not respecting social distancing and
not wearing masks.
The number of new infections rose
by a further 3,781 yesterday.
The strict measures for Spain’s
schools are in line with a series of tough
new regulations for other areas of its
daily life.
Salvador Illa, Spain’s health minister,
cracked down on the country’s nightlife
this month by closing discos and bars,
as well as banning restaurants and cafés
from opening late.
Pedro Sánchez, the prime minister,
said this week that 2,000 soldiers would
be trained as virus trackers and made
available to regions that required
support.
He also allowed the regions to apply
lockdown independently.
Fernando Simón, the national health
emergency chief, said that infections
were on the rise in Madrid but had
stabilised somewhat in the regions of
Catalonia and Aragon.Alasdair Fotheringham Madrid
News Coronavirus Wo r l d
Masks are a common sight in Paris and will now be compulsory across theInfections on remote islands
where it is thought they caught
Covid-19. The island chain has
reported 2,268 coronavirus cases,
with 37 deaths.
India recorded 75,760 new cases of
coronavirus yesterday. Infections
have topped 3.3 million with 60,
deaths. The country is the third
worst-hit in the world, behind the
US and Brazil, but is
projected to outstrip
both. Its testing regime
lags far behind other
nations.south korea
Parliament
closed yesterday
and some MPs
went into
quarantine as the
government
announced the
highest daily
number of infections
for five months and the
country moved towards a
new lockdown.
The Korea Centres for Disease
Control reported 441 new cases, the
highest figure since March. The
country won widespread praise for
successfully quelling the early
outbreak in the city of Daegu, but
now finds itself in the grip of a
second wave that is emerging inindia
Ten members of a tribe on the
Andaman Islands in the Bay of
Bengal have tested positive for
coronavirus, raising fears about
both their survival and that of
other indigenous communities in
the remote archipelago, below.
As India set another record for
daily infections, and case
numbers continued to
soar, officials said six
of the Great
Andamanese
were recovering
in quarantine at
home but four
remained in
hospital.
The news led
to concern
about the future
of the island
communities. Over
the past 200 years,
they have been pushed
to the edge of extinction,
first by conflict with British
settlers and then by illnesses
caused by contact with the wider
world. The Great Andamanese live
on tiny Strait Island, where the
government provides their food
and shelter, but some members
work in Port Blair, the capital of
the Andaman and Nicobar Islands,projected
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