PARIS (Reuters) – France will suggest wearing masks in shared work spaces if the country catches a handful of coronavirus cases that have risen to more than 3,000 in the past 24 hours.
Pedestrians wearing protective face masks walk along the river Seine, as France intensifies wearing masks as part of an effort to revive coronavirus (COVID-19) disease across the country, Paris, France, August 15, 2020. REUTERS / Charles Platiau
The Ministry of Health reported 3,310 new coronavirus infections, marking a post-lockdown high for the fourth day in a row.
The number of clusters surveyed grew from 17 to 252, it said in a website update.
The resurrection required Britain to set up a 14-day career for people arriving from France, and allowed the authorities in Paris to expand zones in the capital, where a mask obliges outdoor use.
Employment Minister Elisabeth Borne said she would propose in talks with representatives of employers and unions on Tuesday that masks be mandatory in collective work spaces.
“A theme that appears in all scientific opinions is the value of wearing them (masks) when there are several people in a confined space,” Borne said in an interview with the French newspaper Le Journal du Dimanche.
Doctors have increasingly demanded that masks be required in the workplace, while the HCSP, a body that advises the government on health policy, has issued a recommendation to require masks to be required in all existing indoor spaces.
This week’s rise has taken the seven – day moving average of new infections above the 2,000 threshold for the first time since April, when France was in the midst of one of Europe’s toughest lockdowns.
The number of people in the hospital has gone down in recent weeks, even as new COVID-19 cases have gone up, with experts pointing to the spread of the virus among younger people.
However, the latest daily figures showed a slight increase in the number of hospital patients, at 4,857 against 4,828 a day earlier, as well as an increase in patients with intensive care to 376 out of 367.
Report by Gus Trompiz; Edited by Alison Williams, Giles Elgood and Daniel Wallis
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