The Minister of Health Olivier Véran defended Wednesday, January 13 a new extension of the state of health emergency until June, "
essential
" while the circulation in France of new, more contagious variants of the coronavirus poses an "
increased risk epidemic recovery
”.
Read also: State of health emergency: a report proposes to strengthen the role of Parliament
"
Today we can not deprive ourselves of any tool likely to help us fight the virus
", argued the minister before the law committee of the National Assembly, while some deputies stressed that the proposed bill brings in total to 18 months the duration of the “
state of emergency
” in which the country has lived since the start of the health crisis.
This text, presented on Wednesday morning to the Council of Ministers, will be debated in session in Parliament on January 18 and 25.
In force since October 17, 2020, this exceptional regime which allows the implementation of binding measures to fight the Covid-19 epidemic had already been extended until February 16, 2021. With this new text, the The executive plans to postpone the end of the state of health emergency until June 1 and to continue the transitional regime for exiting the state of emergency until September 30.
"
If the state of health emergency falls, there is no longer a curfew, for example, so there are no longer any national means to curb the epidemic,
" argued Olivier Véran.
The minister assured that the first elements showed that the curfew advanced to 6 p.m. had a "
proven braking effect (...)
" on the epidemic.
"
The curfew at 6:00 p.m. in the departments in which we implemented it on January 2, in 15 departments, shows that the incidence rate, and therefore the evolution of the epidemic, is increasing but much more slowly
" than in the rest of the territory, with an incidence up 16% in the departments concerned between January 2 and 12, against an increase "
of 43% in the other departments
".