COVID-19 pandemic in France
The COVID-19 pandemic in France is part of the worldwide pandemic of coronavirus disease 2019 caused by severe acute respiratory syndrome coronavirus 2. The virus was confirmed to have reached France on 24 January 2020, when the first COVID-19 case in both Europe and France was identified in Bordeaux. The first five confirmed cases were all individuals who had recently arrived from China. A Chinese tourist who was admitted to hospital in Paris on 28 January died on 14 February, making it the first COVID-19 death in France as well as the first COVID-19 death outside Asia. A key event in the spread of the disease across Metropolitan France as well as its overseas territories was the annual assembly of the Christian Open Door Church between 17 and 24 February in Mulhouse which was attended by about 2,500 people, at least half of whom are believed to have contracted the virus. On 4 May, retroactive testing of samples in one French hospital showed that a patient was probably already infected with the virus on 27 December, almost a month before the first officially confirmed case.
On 2 May, Olivier Véran announced that the government would seek to extend the health emergency until 24 July. Many mayors opposed the 11 May lifting of the lockdown, which had been announced by the President a few weeks earlier in a televised address to the nation, and said it was premature. Veran's bill was discussed in Senate on 4 May.
, France has reported 160,377 confirmed cases, 29,640 deaths, and 74,372 recoveries after hospitalization.
According to a team of French epidemiologists, under 5% of the total population of France, or around 2.8 million people, may have been infected with COVID-19. This was believed to have been nearly twice as high in the Ile-de-France and Alsace.
Background
The pandemic occurred following a series of national protests, which were followed by a strike against pension reform which had been proposed by President Emmanuel Macron in his election manifesto. The pension reform strike was the longest strike in modern French history. In President Emmanuel Macron's second address to the nation on the pandemic on 16 March, he announced the suspension of all reforms, notably those of pensions.On 12 January, the World Health Organization confirmed that a novel coronavirus was the cause of a respiratory illness in a cluster of people in Wuhan City, Hubei Province, China, who had initially come to the attention of the WHO on 31 December 2019. On 21 January, Agnès Buzyn, Minister of Solidarity and Health declared that "The risk of introduction into France is low but it cannot be excluded".
Timeline
First cases
On 2 December, a man was admitted to Hôpital Albert Schweitzer ; on 7 May, the director of the medical imagery department claimed that the man had been positive for COVID-19 in December. His thoracic scan, taken in December, was one of several suspicious scans identified by the hospital as being typical of COVID-19, the earliest of these suspicious scans having been on 16 November.On 27 December, a man was admitted to Avicenne Hospital and tested for influenza, which came back as negative. On 3 May, Yves Cohen, head of resuscitation at the hospital, said that following a retest of the man's December sample, it had come back positive for COVID-19. Cohen said it was too early to know if the man had been France's "patient zero".
On 23 January, the French Minister of Health's office published an analysis of the situation, and on the same day Air France suspended its flights from and to Wuhan, and reduced the frequency of its flights from and to Beijing and Shanghai.
On 24 January, the first COVID-19 case in Europe was confirmed in Bordeaux. The victim, a 48-year-old French citizen from China, who arrived in France on 22 January, was hospitalised at Centre Hospitalier Universitaire de Bordeaux. He was placed in isolation, and the authorities tried to trace people who had been in contact with him. On the same day that Agnès Buzyn said that "The risks of propagation of the virus in France are extremely low", two more cases were confirmed in Paris – a couple who had returned from China on 18 January. The 31-year-old man and his 30-year-old partner, both from Wuhan, tested positive for SARS-CoV-2 and were hospitalised at Bichat–Claude Bernard Hospital in Paris. On 26 January, Buzyn declared that the French government had millions of masks which could be distributed to the population if necessary.
On 28 January, an 80-year-old Chinese tourist from Hubei tested positive and was hospitalised at Bichat–Claude Bernard Hospital. The following day, his 50-year-old daughter tested positive and was admitted to the same hospital. The death of the 80-year-old on 14 February marked the first death from COVID-19 outside of Asia.
On 30 January, a Paris doctor who had come into contact with a Chinese tourist whose infection was confirmed upon her return to China was confirmed positive for COVID-19.
On 11 March, the government named 11 prominent scientists to a committee to advise on scientific matters pertaining to the epidemic in France. On 17 March 2020, the Direction générale de la Santé asked Santé publique France to buy urgently 1,1 million of FFP2 masks.
On 31 January, Marie Fontanel, the President counselor for solidarity and health, quit her job to help her husband in the coming municipal elections. She would be replaced only one month later. The same day, all the countries of the Schengen Area, except France, suspended the issuing of visas in China.
Les Contamines-Montjoie cluster
On 8 February, then-Minister of Health Agnès Buzyn confirmed five new cases which originated from a group of people who were on a holiday in Les Contamines-Montjoie, Haute-Savoie. They contracted the infection from a British national who had attended a conference in Singapore a few days before. Another British national, who had stayed in the same chalet as the five other individuals at Les Contamines-Montjoie, tested positive for COVID-19. On 18 February, Minister of Health, Olivier Véran – who replaced Agnès Buzyn after she stood down to run in the Paris mayoral election for LREM – announced that only four people remained infected in France. These four, all British nationals, three from the first group of Les Contamines-Montjoie and a fourth case which was discovered later, underwent quarantine at the hospital. The last remaining British national was discharged six days later.Sundry cases
In late February, multiple cases appeared in France, notably within three new clusters, in Oise, Haute-Savoie, and Morbihan..
On 25 February, a French teacher from Crépy-en-Valois died; on the same day, a Chinese man who had returned from China was confirmed as a carrier of SARS-CoV-2, but showed signs of recent recovery. A 64-year-old man from La Balme-de-Sillingy, who returned from a trip to Lombardy on 15 February, tested positive for SARS-CoV-2 and was treated in Centre Hospitalier Annecy-Genevois, Épagny-Metz-Tessy. His wife also tested positive and was admitted to the same hospital as her husband.
On 26 February, a 36-year-old man, who had made multiple trips to Lombardy, tested positive and was treated in Nouvel Hôspital Civil, Strasbourg. A 60-year-old French teacher from Oise was first admitted to Creil Hospital, then transferred to Pitié-Salpêtrière Hospital, Paris, where he died a few hours later. A 55-year-old man from Oise was admitted to the intensive care unit at CHU Amiens-Picardie, Amiens.
The same day, during an audition by the French Senate, Jérôme Salomon, the French Directeur général de la Santé, declared that "A mask shortage is not a subject".
On 27 February, the Minister of Health Olivier Véran announced that France had 38 cases of COVID-19 on its soil, with 20 new cases detected including a cluster in the Oise caused by close contacts with patients that were infected in Egypt.
On 28 February, one new case was confirmed, a 23-year-old fashion student from Nice who had recently returned from Milan. Landes confirmed the first case of COVID-19 in the region, a woman who tested positive at Centre Hospitalier de Mont-de-Marsan and underwent isolation.
Mulhouse cluster
A religious week in Mulhouse that took place from 17 to 24 February 2020 was involved in the rapid spread of the virus to eastern France and beyond. Linked cases developed from early March in Orléans, Besançon, Saint-Lô, Belfort, Dijon, Mâcon, Agen, Briançon, Paris, Corsica, and French Guiana.The annual gathering of the Christian Open Door Church between 17 and 24 February in Mulhouse which was attended by about 2,500 people became a significant cluster in the spread of coronavirus in France. Alerted by a parishioner and by 18 family members who tested positive on 1 March, the pastor notified the health authorities. A man who lived alone in Nîmes – and who had driven back alone from Mulhouse and who otherwise had no close contacts – tested positive, and the flurry of reported cases locally on 2 March brought the existence of a Mulhouse cluster to light. On 3 March, seven participants in the evangelical rally – including five members of a local family and a general practitioner from Bernwiller – had tested positive for the virus. Starting on the evening of 3 March, the local helpline of the Emergency medical services recorded an unprecedented flood of distress calls, from people who had attended the gathering. According to an investigative report by Radio France, at least half of the attendees had contracted the virus; in an interview on France Info, the pastor of the church admitted that 2000 attendees may have been infected. It is said that no specific health advice existed in light of the threat at the time. The source of the initial infection has not been determined; furthermore, as different attendees were welcomed each day, and due to the absence of any attendance register, epidemiological followup subsequent to the discovery of attendees who tested positive was rendered impossible. Even President Emmanuel Macron had spent several hours electioneering on 18 February in the Bourtzwiller district close to the church. It was only on 2 March when the health authorities woke up to data that there was an outbreak all over the country linked to the religious meeting, by which time secondary infections had spread out of control.
A Radio France investigation identified that one nurse who had attended the event was the origin of a subsequent cluster in Strasbourg at her workplace at the Strasbourg University Hospitals involving some 250 hospital colleagues. Five returnees from the Mulhouse rally were confirmed in French Guiana on 4 March. On 5 March, a retired couple from Lot-et-Garonne and another person from Deux-Sèvres who had attended the same Mulhouse gathering were declared positive for the disease. Five new cases from this cluster were registered in Corsica, and three in Normandy. On 6 March, with 81 cases that had been detected in the previous 24 hours in Mulhouse, the departmental prefect declared that the means were no longer sufficient to systematically screen all suspected cases; only the most serious patients were to be hospitalised. The department of Haut Rhin, in which Mulhouse is situated, imposed strict limits on the gatherings; all schools were closed henceforth.
Repatriations
On 31 January, approximately 220 French returnees from China landed at Istres-Le Tubé Air Base, aboard an Airbus A340 from Esterel 3/60 transport squadron stationed at Creil Air Base. These evacuees were quarantined in a holiday camp in Carry-le-Rouet. A second wave of repatriation took place on 2 February when 65 evacuated French nationals on board a chartered Airbus A380-800 Hi Fly landed at the Istres air base. A third repatriation of 38 French occurred on 8 February 2020 under the auspices of the British government.On 21 February, a further thirty French people who had been staying in Wuhan were repatriated to France and placed in quarantine at Branville, in the Calvados. On 13 March, twelve trainee gendarmes at the School of Gendarmerie of Tulle saw their internship in Spain terminated, with them and their 20 companions repatriated. They had been confined from 10 March 2020 following the positive test results of two of their Spanish cohort.
Municipal elections
The first round of municipal elections in France took place on 15 March 2020 against the backdrop of the government decision to move to Stage III of measures to prevent the spread of the coronavirus. Stringent restrictions on public life involving the closure of bars, restaurants and other businesses considered non-essential were set to begin the following day. Then-Health Minister, Agnès Buzyn, resigned on 16 February 2020 to run for the Paris mayor for LREM. She is succeeded by Olivier Véran, a neurologist. The decision to press ahead with the election was justified as being critical to democratic life in the country, despite concerns about how a second round could be held as the toll of infections and deaths continued to rise. In the end, the turnout of registered voters was 40%, lower than achieved in 1971 – the previous record lowest turnout.A number of communes in various parts of the country reported that despite the safety measures put in place by the government, some candidates and assessors had subsequently developed symptoms or tested positive for the virus.
Lockdown
On 16 March, Emmanuel Macron announced the beginning of a lockdown period from the 17 March at noon. It was initially planned for 15 days, then for 30 days, but on 13 April, he announced that the lockdown period would be extended until 11 May.After the announcement of the lockdown, the Fédération Française du Bâtiment decided to stop non-essential work because of the danger for construction workers. On 19 March, Muriel Pénicaud, the French Minister of Labour, criticized this decision, saying that it showed a lack of civic spirit. On 20 March, the President of the federation replied in an open letter that what the Minister said was "scandalous". After several days, an agreement allowing a few construction sites to reopen was signed.
Situation by region
Auvergne-Rhône-Alpes
On 25 February, a man from La Balme-de-Sillingy, who had returned from Italy, was declared infected and hospitalised in Annecy. He had been asymptomatic the previous evening, and so was the trigger for a cluster in Haute-Savoie. One day later his wife was hospitalised. On 27 February, a friend and his daughter followed him into the hospital. On 2 March, 26 people were COVID-19 positive in Haute-Savoie. The hospital in Annecy being saturated, a case was transferred to Chambéry. François Daviet, the mayor of La Balme-de-Sillingy was also hospitalised.On 27 February, a man from Francheville was admitted to a Lyon hospital and tested positive for coronavirus. Three new cases were reported in the city of Lyon on 1 March.
A couple from Divonne-les-Bains were infected after a journey in Italy and hospitalised in neighbouring Switzerland on 29 February. On the same day, two other men from Ferney-Voltaire, one French national who works in Switzerland and one Italian national, were also hospitalised in the Helvetic Country.
On 2 March, an 89-year-old woman from Nyons was treated at Valréas hospital in the Enclave of the Popes in Vaucluse and tested COVID-19 positive. On the same day there were four new cases in Haute-Savoie.
Burgundy-Franche-Comté
On 2 March 10 cases were reported at the Dijon hospital. The first wave was reported on 27 February with cases related to the Oise cluster who subsequently infected their relatives. Five new cases of COVID-19 were confirmed on 3 March. The 15 cases in the region received care at Dijon CHU. Four cases in Côte-d'Or had been in contact with someone who was already hospitalised, while another case in Saône-et-Loire was in Italy the previous week.Brittany
On 2 March 19 cases were reported in Brittany. Two were in the western city of Brest, an elderly man from Plougonvelin, returning from a trip from Egypt and his wife. There were also four cases in the regional capital Rennes, a firefighter and his wife, and two people who had returned from Veneto. 13 others cases were reported in Morbihan, around a cluster of 6 in Crac'h, 3 in Auray, 3 in Carnac and 1 in Saint-Philibert.Also on 2 March, the fourth death in France, and the first one in Brittany occurred, a 92-year-old man, who had been hospitalised in Vannes.
As of 29 March 962 cases had been reported as follows : 208 in Ille-et-Vilaine, 230 in Finistère, 313 in Morbihan and 107 in Côtes d'Armor.
Grand Est
On 26 February, a 36-year-old man who had made repeated trips to the Italian region of Lombardy was hospitalised in Strasbourg but didn't have severe symptoms.On 2 March, it was announced that ten more people tested positive in the Grand Est, eight hospitalised in Strasbourg and three in Nancy. In Alsace, a Molsheim couple was hospitalised. The man had returned from Italy and was hospitalised first, followed by his wife. Four members of a family from Hésingue, a 27-year-old mother and her two children aged five and one, as well as one of the grandfathers, a 57-year-old man, were infected. Two others cases identified in the Bas-Rhin, a 49-year-old man and his 14-year-old son, had been in contact with a person from the Oise hospitalised in Amiens. Three family members were hospitalised in Nancy, a father and his son, aged 50 and 23, and the girl-friend of the 50-year-old patient, all from the department of Aisne.
Hauts-de-France
As of 2 March 67 people were infected by COVID-19 in the Hauts-de-France region. This figure, the highest in France, was linked to a major cluster originating in the city of Creil, in the Oise, whose source remains unknown. The five departments of Hauts-de-France now each had at least one proven case of people infected by the coronavirus. In Aisne and Pas-de-Calais, spared by the epidemic until 1 March, the authorities confirmed the presence of patients with COVID-19, except the Nord where hospitalisations without local infections had taken place.Some days before, on 26 February, a man died overnight after being rushed to a Paris hospital from Creil where he was hospitalised for 6 days in ICU in serious condition, bringing the total death toll in the country to two at that time. On 2 March, it was announced the second death in Hauts-de-France and the third at the national level, a woman of 89 "diagnosed post-mortem" at the hospital of Compiègne. She had other serious pre-existing conditions.
Île-de-France
On 25 February, a young woman returned from China was hospitalised in the Bichat–Claude Bernard Hospital, Paris but showed signs of recovery and was out of hospital on 26 February.On 28 February, an infected person from the Val-d'Oise, returning from Italy was hospitalised in Bichat–Claude Bernard Hospital, Paris. He was working for a contractor of Charles de Gaulle Airport. On the same day,, which had received a patient from the Oise before he had been diagnosed, announced that it had been directly affected by the coronavirus with three infected medical personnel.
Two cases of Coronavirus had been identified in Seine-Saint-Denis in Montreuil in the same family, a father and his child, on 2 March.
Despite the coronavirus pandemic a substantial International Women's Day march occurred in Paris on 8 March.
Normandy
On 27 February, a doctor from the Rouen University Hospital was declared a positive carrier of COVID-19 and was confined to his home, after a professional journey to Munich. A second case of coronavirus was confirmed in Normandy on 2 March. He is a French resident in Eure. He was hospitalised at the Rouen University Hospital.New Aquitaine
After news of the first infected individuals in Europe had been released in late January, three new patients were declared COVID-19 positive in February, a patient in Bordeaux who was hospitalised at the Bordeaux University Hospital after returning from a stay in Italy, a soldier from Rochefort, Charente-Maritime who had had contact with people from the Creil air base in the Oise, who was hospitalised in Poitiers, and a woman from Mont-de-Marsan was had also been in contact with cases in Creil, who was hospitalised in Bordeaux.Occitania
Three cases were declared in Occitania in February, all in Montpellier. A man who recently returned from Italy was diagnosed on 27 February, followed the next day by his wife and a 41-year-old man recently returned from Emilia-Romagna. On 1 March, the two children of the couple were hospitalised and one was COVID-19 positive. On 2 March, two new cases were announced there: a 31-year-old man and his 29-year-old wife, also back from Emilia-Romagna. One day later, a 70-year-old man from the village of Boisset-et-Gaujac in the Gard was hospitalised in Nîmes.On 2 March, a case in Nimes was traced to the mid-February Mulhouse Megachurch event. This case helped identify the Mulhouse cluster.
Pays de la Loire
A 58-year-old female general practitioner, tested positive for coronavirus and was hospitalised on 27 February at the Nantes University Hospital. Hers was the first confirmed case in the Pays de la Loire region. She lived near Compiègne, in the Oise department, where a dozen cases had already been identified. On 13 February she had seen a patient who was later hospitalised in an intensive care unit in Amiens.On 2 March, four people were hospitalised at the Angers University Hospital for cases of coronavirus. The first case was detected on 28 February; a 27-year-old woman from the Sarthe declared herself to the SAMU centre 15 after a stay in Milan in Italy. Three other cases have since been detected in Mayenne and Maine-et-Loire. They were infected by a patient from Brest.
Provence-Alpes-Côte d'Azur
The first case of the Provence-Alpes-Côte d'Azur region was announced on 28 February. A young woman from Cannes was infected after a journey in Milan. One day later three new cases were hospitalised, two French vacationers returned from a risk zone and an Italian tourist. Two new cases appeared during the weekend of 29 February and 1 March: a 15-year-old adolescent and a 23-year-old woman. On 2 March, a seventh case was announced, a 3-year-old girl.On 29 February, Monaco announced its first COVID-19 case, a man who was admitted to the Princess Grace Hospital Centre, then transferred to the Nice University Hospital in France.
On 22 March, the Alpes-Maritimes prefecture issued a decree putting into place a curfew from 10 pm to 5 am affecting cities of more than 10,000 residents and all towns on the Mediterranean coast until 31 March 2020. This replaced local measures which had already been taken in Nice, Béziers, and Cannes.
Overseas regions
French Guiana
As of 4 March, French Guiana had five confirmed cases, all in Saint-Laurent du Maroni. The first death was announced on 20 April 2020.Guadeloupe
By 26 March, there had been 84 positive cases and 1 death in Guadeloupe.Martinique
The COVID-19 pandemic was confirmed to have reached the Martinique on 5 March 2020. By 15 March, the first virus-related death had occurred and there were 15 infected patients in Martinique.Mayotte
The COVID-19 pandemic was confirmed to have reached Mayotte on 10 March 2020. On 31 March the first person died of COVID-19.Réunion
The COVID-19 pandemic was confirmed to have reached Réunion on 11 March 2020.Overseas collectivities
French Polynesia
, a French politician representing French Polynesia at the French national assembly, was diagnosed with the first case of COVID-19 in French Polynesia on 11 March.New Caledonia
As of 19 March, there have been two cases in New Caledonia.Saint Barthélemy
A resident of the French island of Saint Barthélemy was diagnosed with COVID-19 on 1 March. His parents on the neighbouring island of Saint Martin also tested positive.Saint Martin
A couple from the French part of Saint Martin island was diagnosed with COVID-19 on 1 March. Their son, who lives on the neighbouring island of Saint Barthélemy, also tested positive.''Charles de Gaulle'' aircraft carrier
The Ministry of Armed Forces reported infections on board one of its ships on 8 April 2020. After about 40 crew members aboard the aircraft carrier showed symptoms, the ship cut short its mission and returned to its home port of Toulon on 12 April 11 days earlier than planned. The ministry initially announced that out of 66 personnel tested, 50 were positive. Three sailors were evacuated by air to. On 18 April, the final count of infected crew members was announced as 1,046 with nearly 50 percent diagnosed as asymptomatic.The carrier arrived in Toulon on the afternoon of 12 April when a 14-day quarantine for the crew began. The source of the infection remains unknown, as the last port of call had been Brest from 13 to 15 March.
There was criticism in France the carrier mission was not interrupted after the first cases were detected, and rumours that the carrier had asked permission to interrupt its mission in mid March during its stopover in Brest, which had been refused. Florence Parly, the French Minister of Armed Forces, said that these rumours were false when questioned by French deputies.
Effects on civilian life
Closures
On 28 February, the fashion designer agnès b. cancelled fashion shows in Paris Fashion Week, which had been scheduled to run until 3 March. The following day, the Paris half marathon scheduled for Sunday 1 March with 44,000 participants was cancelled as one of a number of measures announced by health minister Olivier Véran.In a televised statement on 12 March, President of the Republic Emmanuel Macron decreed the closure of nurseries, schools, colleges, high schools and universities. The Ministry of Health requested the deprogramming of non-urgent surgical procedures. From the next day, gatherings of more than 100 people were prohibited.
On 13 March, the Ligue de Football Professionnel suspended Ligue 1 and Ligue 2 indefinitely due to health risks.
On 14 March, many cultural institutions announced their closure. These are mainly Parisian institutions or institutions in the Paris region, such as Louvre, Centre Georges Pompidou, Eiffel Tower, Musée d'Orsay, and Château de Versailles, but also institutions in the provinces such as Château de Montsoreau – Museum of Contemporary Art, CAPC – Musée d'Art Contemporain de Bordeaux, MUCEM in Marseille.
Restrictions on movement
Starting from 23 March 2020, everyone in a public space was required to carry a self-completed declaration, known as an "Attestation de déplacement dérogatoire", which stated one's reasons for being out in public. Without this declaration individuals could be fined if found engaging in non-essential movement. Acceptable reasons for being outside included: shopping for food and essential needs, traveling to and from a place of work, if the work could not be performed at home, accessing necessary healthcare, traveling for essential family matters including childcare or care of the elderly or to assist vulnerable people, exercising within 1 km of the home for up to 1 hour during permitted hours, for an administrative legal matter, or at the direction of an administrative authority. Initially it was necessary to carry a paper copy of the declaration but later a QR code based electronic equivalent for smartphones became an option. Most of the requirements of these measures expired on 11 May with the expiration of the general stay-at-home order however new requirements subsequently came into effect limiting general travel to a range of 100 km from one's residence without a permit. The 100 km limitation remained in effect until 2 June.Police around the country set up road blocks to check those outside their homes had good reason and that their exemption declarations were in order. Up to 7 April, more than 8 million checks had been made, and half a million fines had been issued for failure to respect rules of confinement. Police report receiving hundreds of telephone denunciations from citizens complaining of their neighbours walking their dogs too often; a woman also denounced her husband for going out to see his mistress.
Unemployment
President Macron announced that companies could postpone the payment of social security contributions and taxes due in March without justification, formalities, or penalties. An "exceptional and massive" mechanism of state-funded furloughing was envisaged. Employees were encouraged to practise teleworking where possible. During the second half of March, 4 million French workers applied for temporary unemployment benefits. As at April 2020, approximately 8.6 million employees in France were furloughed. The total cost of the operation for the three months from March amounts to €24 billion.The French state, which has hitherto borne 100% of the costs of furloughing, reduced the indemnity to 85% from 1 June 2020, with businesses footing 15% of the bill; employees will receive 70% of their gross pay, or around 84% of their net salary. Employees in sectors of activity related to restaurants, culture and tourism, which remain subject to forced closure, continue to receive 100% state indemnity.
Riots in the Paris region
From 18 April, suburbs near Paris saw several nights of violent clashes over police treatment of ethnic minorities in the banlieues during the coronavirus lockdown.Fatal bus attack
On 5 July, a 59-year-old male bus driver in Bayonne was left brain dead after being attacked by passengers who refused to pay for tickets and to wear face masks on his bus. Five people were arrested, two men were charged with attempted murder, two others with non-assistance to a person in danger and a fifth with attempting to hide a suspect. The four culprits of the attack, Mohamed C., Mohammed A., Moussa B. and Selim Z., were later revealed to have previous extensive criminal records. The driver died on 10 July, five days after the attack.Shortage of masks controversy
Strategic stocks of masks in 2009 under Roselyne Bachelot, minister of health from May 2007 to November 2010, amounted to 1 billion surgical masks and 600 million FFP2 masks. According to the French government, a change of doctrine had occurred upon recommendations from the General Health Directorate in July 2011, the decision was taken then to allow depletion of strategic stocks on the grounds of cost of maintaining the stockpile – including arbitrating the cost of obsolescence. Stock of surgical masks and FFP2 masks in late 2019 had dropped to 140 million and zero units respectively.Then-health minister Agnès Buzyn declared on 26 January that there would be no shortage of masks in France during the outbreak. Later on 26 February, Jérôme Salomon, the French Directeur général de la Santé, declared during a debate by the French Senate that "A mask shortage is not a subject". However, health professionals complained that they were ill-equipped to face the crisis, due to inadequate stocks of protective equipment. On 3 March, with France still facing a shortage, President Macron commandeered all masks produced and stored in the country for distribution to health professionals and people who had contracted the virus.
France was subsequently accused of seizing medical equipment intended for other nations. On 5 March 2020, French authorities confiscated four million masks from the Swedish health care company Mölnlycke, which were in a distribution centre in Lyon and destined for Spain and Italy. Two weeks later, after pressure from the Swedish government, France released the masks, allowing two million of them through, with the rest remaining in France either to be used there or for re-export. Mölnlycke estimated that a total of "six million masks were seized by the French. All had been contracted for, including a million masks each for France, Italy and Spain. The rest were destined for Belgium, the Netherlands, Portugal and Switzerland."
On 27 April 2020, it was revealed by Libération that, contrary to government claims in March, a change of doctrine was not the main cause of the mask shortage, and that the government had been fully informed as early as 2018 that strategic reserves were depleted.
On 8 May 2020, the government announced that 200 million masks per week would be available starting on 11 May: 100 million for medical workers and 100 million for the general public.
Hydroxychloroquine controversy
On 17 March 2020, Didier Raoult of the Mediterranean infectious and tropical disease institute in Marseille and member of the scientific council advising the government announced in a YouTube video entitled "Coronavirus: endgame!” that a trial by his team involving 24 patients supported the claim that hydroxychloroquine and azithromycin were effective in treating COVID-19. The design of the study as well as its conclusions are controversial and generally viewed as flawed and inconclusive. Raoult has nevertheless offered testing of those with symptoms at his institute and prescribed hydroxychloroquine for those who tested positive. The French Health Minister, Olivier Véran, announced that "new tests will now go ahead to evaluate the results of Raoult, to independently replicate the trials and ensure the findings are scientifically robust, before any possible decision might be made to roll any treatment out to the wider public".On 30 March, hospitals reported that there had been two dozen cases with three deaths of individuals who were suspected of self-medication with Plaquenil – a brand name for hydroxychloroquine. Drug safety agency warned against potentially fatal side effects, notably cardiac arrhythmia and heart attack. The agency banned its use, even with prescriptions, outside of hospitals, and in clinical trials, while stepping up its surveillance.
Raoult later resigned from the committee, and defended chloroquine as a drug that has been safely used for 80 years.
Chinese Embassy article
In mid-April, the Chinese embassy published an online article entitled "Restoring distorted facts – Observations of a Chinese diplomat posted to Paris", which criticised western countries' slow response and accused workers at nursing homes in France of "abandoning their posts overnight … and leaving their residents to die of hunger and disease". French Foreign Minister Jean-Yves Le Drian summoned the Chinese ambassador, and said that the remarks were not in line with the "quality of the bilateral relationship" between France and China.Cooperation with neighbouring states
On 29 February 2020, Monaco announced the first COVID-19 case, a man who was admitted to the Princess Grace Hospital Centre, then transferred to Nice University Hospital in France. Also on 29 February 2020, three French nationals and one Italian resident of Ain were being hospitalised in Lausanne or other places in Switzerland.On 22 March 2020, Switzerland announced that three hospitals near the Alsace region had agreed to take in any French-based patients after Alsace officials made a request for assistance. Patients from Grand Est were also taken into hospitals in Baden-Württemberg, :Rhineland-Palatinate, Saarland, and Hesse in Germany.
Up to 1 April 2020 over 100 COVID-19 patients from Alsace had been transferred for treatment to Germany, Luxembourg, and Switzerland.
Statistics
Deaths from retirement homes and assisted living facilities since 1 March were reported from 2 April.
INSEE death statistics (all causes of death)
Location statistics
Death excess by town density
Death per administrative region
Apart from the Petite Couronne, cases have been detected either by a late discovery or by a local infection in the following departments: Gironde, Haute-Savoie, Bas-Rhin, Val-d'Oise, Hérault, Finistère, Lyon Metropolis, Côte-d'Or, Alpes-Maritimes, Seine-Maritime, Loire-Atlantique, Ain, Landes, Charente-Maritime, Mayenne, Ille-et-Vilaine, Morbihan, Haut-Rhin, Eure, Sarthe, Gard, Drôme, Saône-et-Loire, all the departments of the region Hauts-de-France, except the Nord, and in the overseas territories of Saint Barthélemy and Saint Martin.