“This is absolutely not an anti-vaccine sling.
My wife, Francine and I have been vaccinated for a long time.
Only the vaccine will allow us to get out of this pandemic ”, immediately reframes the initiator of the Zoo refuge, which comes to the aid of animals rescued from poaching, withdrawn from outlawed individuals but also of wild species, illegally detained, from laboratories or circuses.
“But instead of the health pass, we ask that we impose a gauge, with compulsory mask, of 40 m² per person. We are outside. The park is 20 hectares. It would be much more than in shops, where it is 8 m² per person, ”continues Patrick Violas.
According to him, it is a question of survival: “This is our first year of opening.
In July, attendance was very good.
We were making up to 3,000 admissions a day.
On July 21, we applied the health pass, we went to 300 entries.
We immediately set up antigenic tests outside.
It hardly changed anything.
People who come with their families don't want a swab put in their noses.
We have decided to stop applying the health pass, we have returned to attendance, certainly lower than it should be, but we are now only recording a 40% loss ”.
" We do not have the choice "
The prefecture of Eure-et-Loir has put the zoo-refuge on notice to comply with the measure, under penalty of administrative closure.
This did not change Patrick Violas's opinion: “The parks achieve, over the months of July and August, 80% of their annual figures.
We are illegal but we have no choice.
The structure has the equivalent of 80 full-time jobs that have to be paid for.
And we are missing out on aid because we were not open in 2019, ”he insists.
Read also Health pass: leisure parks "in total distress"
Visitors have joined forces on social networks and threaten to come and demonstrate to prevent the police from intervening: “We will not go as far as demonstrations. We want the assurance of being helped. We're just asking for a gauge. If we succeed and are then followed, our initiative would save dozens of fleets and thus avoid hundreds of layoffs. "
