France tightens virus curfew in several regions

PARIS: The French government on Friday announced that it was bringing forward by two hours a the nighttime curfew in 15 regions to help combat the coronavirus, as infections remain high.

The 15 of France’s 101 departments affected by the switch to a curfew beginning at 6:00 pm rather than 8:00 pm include the Les Alpes-Maritimes department where the Mediterranean city of Nice is located.

The other areas are concentrated in the east of the country and Paris has, for now, been spared the additional restriction. "The virus is continuing to spread in France... but with a disparity between regions," said government spokesman Gabriel Attal as he announced the move.

"If the situation were to deteriorate further in certain areas, we will take the necessary decisions," he told TF1 broadcaster. The measure had been urged by mayors increasingly concerned that their local health systems are being overburdened by an influx of new cases.

Attal also confirmed that theatres, cinemas and concert halls would not be able to reopen from January 7, the most recent minimum date given for their closure. Attal meanwhile defended the pace of France’s campaign to vaccinate against Covid-19, which TF1 noted has seen just 332 people vaccinated in the country so far compared with over 130,000 in Germany since it began last weekend.

Arguing that France was targeting its campaign on care homes for the elderly which took more time, he said: "We are not going to judge a vaccination campaign that will last six months in just a few days".Meanwhile, global humanitarian figures and NGOs have urged world leaders to urgently make Covid-19 vaccinations available to millions of refugees and others displaced by war, as the pandemic continues to overwhelm some of the world’s most vulnerable communities.

The impact of the contagion has sharply intensified across the Middle East in recent weeks, matching soaring global numbers. However, it has been further amplified by drastically underresourced medical responses that cannot cope with the numbers of dying or seriously ill.

In northern Syria and Iraq, where millions of people remain displaced or in internment camps, images of vaccines being administered in the US and UK have heightened fears that the collective efforts of global scientists will be focused on developed societies.

The UN secretary general, António Guterres, has pleaded for the vaccines being rolled out across the globe to be made available to “all people” and that their distribution must be viewed as a “global public good”.

His comments followed mounting concerns that a scheme to deliver Covid vaccines to poorer countries faces a high risk of failure and could leave at least half the planet without vaccinations for at least the next three years.

The World Health Organisation (WHO) is administering the rollout to poorer nations and said it aims to have 2 billion people vaccinated by the end of 2021.

However, the target has been described by senior UN officials as ambitious and unlikely to be met without a serious upscaling of resources and political mobilisation. The UN’s refugee body, UNHCR, and the International Organization for Migration (IOM) have added weight to the concerns, imploring that refugees and migrants are included in governments’ vaccine allocations.

“In these times of pandemic and beyond, [we] … stand ready to support governments in their efforts to make health care available for all, through universal health coverage, a reality,” said IOM director general António Vitorino.

Meanwhile, British hospitals around the country face a perilous situation in January, medical workers warned on Friday amid surging coronavirus infections blamed on a new virus variant. Authorities pressed to reactivate field hospitals previously mothballed just to handle the crush of new patients.

Concerns are mounting about the ability of the already stretched National Health Service to cope with the anticipated increase in people seeking treatment for Covid-19 infections over the coming weeks that could be further fueled by holiday gatherings over Christmas and New Year’s.

On Friday, the UK recorded another 53,285 new infections, down slightly from the previous day’s record high of 55,892. Although comparisons with the outset of the pandemic are difficult given that testing was limited in the spring, the UK has recorded its four highest daily new infection numbers over the past four days — all above 50,000 and around double the daily number of a few weeks ago.