France imposes new border controls

PARIS: New border controls came into force in France on Sunday as part of a massive effort to contain the spread of COVID-19 and avoid another nationwide lockdown.

Ater a slow start to vaccinations, French health authorities reported that a million people had received coronavirus inoculations by Saturday.

But stubbornly high new rates for infections, hospitalisations and COVID-19 deaths fuelled fears France may need another full lockdown, which would be the third, inflicting yet more devastation on businesses and daily lives.

Starting Sunday, arrivals to France from European Union countries by air or sea must be able to produce a negative PCR test result obtained in the previous 72 hours.

The requirement had already applied to non-eu arrivals since mid-january.

EU travellers entering France by land, including cross-border workers, will not need a negative test.

Some 62,000 people currently arrive in French airports and sea ports from other EU countries every week, according to Transport Minister Jean-baptiste Djebbari.

Paris’s main international airport RoissyCharles-de-gaulle set up testing centres in a terminal dedicated to intra-eu flights to allow arriving passengers who failed to obtain a test in their country of origin to get one before passing immigration.

On Sunday, incoming passengers seemed happy to comply.

“When I arrive in a country, the idea is not to contaminate it,” Antoine, an 18-year old Belgian, said at the airport.

“It’s up to us to show that we are civicminded,” said Claudio Barraza, a Spaniard. “I was actually surprised to learn that the test wasn’t mandatory before.”

The French health agency on Saturday reported 23,924 new COVID-19 cases in the previous 24 hours, and 321 new coronavirus deaths, taking the French death toll to 72,877.

The total number of hospitalised Covid patients stood at 25,800, of whom nearly 2,900 were in intensive care.