"Don't go on weekends!" Friday, at the end of a sunny week and at "D4" of confinement deemed insufficiently respected, the government issued firmness instructions, recalling that France is only at the "beginning" of the epidemic of coronavirus which already weighs heavily on health services.
"It is a speed race started with the virus, but even as we are at the beginning, we need to keep a lot of responsiveness" , insisted the president Emmanuel Macron while visiting the Interministerial Crisis Cell before a new Council defense.
The prolongation of the confinement, decreed until at least the end of March, "has not been recorded" for the moment, according to the Minister of the Interior Christophe Castaner. But everything suggests that sooner or later it will be like in Italy, which now records the most deaths in the world (more than 4,000, ahead of China).
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" It is quite likely that we will be forced to extend containment," agreed government spokeswoman Sibeth Ndiaye. It can stop "when the virus will no longer circulate" , insisted in Le Figaro Olivier Véran, the Minister of Health, estimating the total number of patients in France at 20,000 - the majority of them not being tested.
"Do not go on weekends , " insisted Professor Salomon Friday evening: in addition to the "risk of new contacts" during transport by car or train, "you risk unknowingly transporting the virus from major cities to campaigns " , or to arrive " in an area where there is not necessarily health infrastructure capable of taking care of many patients " .
The number two of the Ministry of Health also called for compliance with barrier measures, hand washing and the minimum distance of one meter between individuals.
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Christophe Castaner warned that the decreed restrictions will be applied "even more strictly" with controls in stations (only 15% of mainline trains will run) and airports in particular, and fixed fines of 135 euros in the event of "violation of prohibitions on moving outside one's home ” . Persons already fined for unjustified exits were thus placed in police custody for "endangering the life of others" . Tougher measures demanded by many health professionals.
And places closed to the public have multiplied, from the quays of the Seine in Paris or those of the Garonne in Bordeaux to the Promenade des Anglais in Nice: surveillance of the seaside is carried out by drone equipped with a loudspeaker and a curfew will be imposed in the next few days, according to the mayor's entourage.