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Rabat – Amid a second wave of COVID-19 infections, France hopes to stop the virus before Christmas on December 25. Moroccans will remember the unease that the French feel as an important religious holiday approaches.
As in the months leading up to Eid Al Fitr, families in France now fear for their annual religious holidays amid a COVID-19 crisis.
Christmas in danger
French government spokesman Gabriel Attal said on Sunday that every effort was being made to ensure that Christmas could be celebrated “as normally as possible.” He stressed that the government does not want “a Christmas via video.”
In order to prepare France for the holidays, the government will schedule a COVID-19 review in mid-November to determine the success of its second national lockdown.
On September 28, France’s Health Minister Olivier Veran declared that France should not have a “preventive” COVID-19 lockdown to “save Christmas.”
The idea of a preventive COVID-19 lockdown, across France, which will last from December 1 to December 20, was proposed by married and Nobel Prize-winning professors Banerjee and Duflo at Le Monde.
“Family gatherings, with their long moments of socializing around a table (not to mention singing), unfortunately lead to contamination,” said Professors Banerjee and Duflo.
The Christmas holiday celebrates the birth of Jesus, whom Christians believe to be the son of God. The day has evolved into more than a religious festival, evolving into a beloved day for family gatherings for both believers and non-believers. France is now aiming to ensure that current COVID-19 measures achieve desired goals before announcing changes.
Sad landmark
The government’s announcement comes during a weekend in which France passed a sad milestone in its COVID-19 epidemic. France has recorded 40,169 deaths from COVID-19 out of a total of 1.75 million cases so far. The country has registered 620,778 new cases since October 24, with daily cases in the tens of thousands.
“The second wave has come here in a brutal, violent way,” Prime Minister Jean Castex said on Twitter. It is concerning that 87% of intensive care units in France are now occupied by COVID-19 patients, despite an increase in capacity since April.
For several days in a row, the country has registered a record number of new infections. France saw 87,000 new COVID-19 cases on Saturday alone. The devastating figures prompted the government to institute a second national lockdown in an effort to contain the spread of the virus.
Economic threat
The second national lockdown comes before an important month for French retailers.
Four federations of physical retailers have called on the government to ban the “Black Friday” shopping bonanza. They have also called for restrictions on online sales, asking to limit sales only to basic needs. They have requested that non-essential businesses reopen on November 12.
Economy Minister Bruno Le Maire told the French daily Le Figaro that such a reopening would depend on the government’s “new health rules.”
The month before Christmas is a busy shopping month in France and Europe in general. Christmas is typically a day when families exchange gifts, and retailers often see a huge increase in retail sales online and in person. With France in a COVID-19 lockdown, traditional retailers appear to fear that customers will exclusively use online stores.
The retail industry and France as a whole are completely dependent on the epidemiological situation surrounding COVID-19. Health Minister Olivier Veran said Sunday that the impacts of the first minute of the shutdown are becoming visible. However, he dampened hopes and warned that it is too early for the government to draw conclusions.
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