Faced with the progression of the epidemic, the executive is toughening some of its measures.
On leaving the Council of Ministers on Wednesday, the government spokesperson announced that the health pass would be required to access large shopping centers and department stores located in the departments where the virus is progressing the most.
Read also: Health pass: a major challenge for shopping centers
In detail, the health pass must be presented at the entrance to establishments located in departments where the incidence rate exceeds 200 per 100,000 people. In mainland France, around thirty territories are already above this limit, in particular in the south of France. Another clarification, not all shopping centers and department stores will be affected: only those whose surface area exceeds 20,000 square meters will have to comply with this obligation, which will be put in place by the prefects.
Until now, the threshold of 200 per 100,000 was not known, but shopping centers knew that their fate would change depending on the health situation of the department in which they are located.
The first prefects have already extended the pass to these establishments: this is the case, for example, in Loire-Atlantique, or in the Pyrénées-Orientales, where the epidemic is circulating strongly.
Professionals fear a drop in attendance
The executive's announcement goes hand in hand with another: the wearing of a mask will also be compulsory inside places subject to the sanitary pass in the departments where the incidence rate is greater than 200. This double movement - restoration of the medical pass and the obligation to wear a mask - must make it possible to limit the risk of contamination as much as possible. And this, while the regional health agencies (ARS) of Corsica, Occitanie, Provence-Alpes-Côte d'Azur and New Aquitaine were forced to trigger their white plan to deal with the upsurge in hospitalizations .
The fact remains that the systematization of the health pass beyond a certain threshold can only reinforce the concerns of professionals. Shopping centers fear a drop in attendance following the extension of the pass, and stress the additional cost of controls for these establishments. "
The flows of a shopping center are not those of a nightclub or a restaurant: in some cases we have to control 20,000 to 30,000 people per day
", underlined this week in
Figaro
the general delegate of the National Council of shopping centers (CNCC), Gontran Thüring.