France adds more than 5,000 new coronavirus cases in one day

PARIS France’s prime minister said Wednesday that reopening schools is “one of the essential conditions” for a restart of the country’s economy, which is hobbled like elsewhere by the coronavirus pandemic. Despite confirmed virus cases rising, Jean Castex insisted that France needs to return to work as well and avoid “falling into an economic and social crisis that would be much more dangerous than the health crisis.” Speaking on France-Inter radio, and later at an annual forum of an association of business chiefs, Medef, Castex urged compatriots to wear masks more but insisted that rising coronavirus infections across the country are “nothing to panic about.” Still, he told the Medef meeting that “we are ready” in a worst-case scenario, while “doing everything to avoid a general reconfinement.” France reported 5,429 new confirmed cases Wednesday in the past 24 hours, far below the crisis levels that French hospitals faced in March and April. But the figure was more than 2,000 cases higher than a day earlier. Neighboring countries are requiring quarantines for visitors from parts or all of France.

There has also been a small but steady uptick in the number of COVID-19 patients in intensive care.While he acknowledged in his radio interview that wearing a mask all the time is “a little annoying,” Castex urged people protesting mask requirements “to think of others, hospital workers, medical workers, vulnerable people. ..