An aggressive COVID-19 testing will be the basis for unwinding its coronavirus lockdown
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France will adopt an aggressive new doctrine on COVID-19 testing from May 11 so that it can slowly unwind its coronavirus lockdown and avoid economic meltdown, Prime Minister Edouard Philippe said on Tuesday.
The number of people who have died from coronavirus infection in France rose by 367 to 23,660 on Tuesday, while the number of confirmed cases was up 1,520 at 129,859, the health ministry said in a statement.
French Prime Minister Edouard Philippe told parliament France would not end its nationwide lockdown unless the number of new cases of coronavirus infection drops below 3,000 per day.
The death tally has increased 1.6% compared to Monday, with the rate slightly slowing over 24 hours.
The number of people in hospital with the COVID-19 infection fell further to 27,484 from 28,055 on Monday and the number of people in intensive care fell to 4,387 from 4,608 on Monday. Both have been on a downward trend for at least two weeks.
The government had set itself a goal of carrying out at least 700,000 tests per week, he said. Once a person tests positive, tracing would begin to identify, test and isolate all those who had been in close contact with the individual. “When we end the lockdown, we will have the capacity to massively scale up testing,” Philippe said in an address to parliament.
He said the lockdown had saved tens of thousands of lives but that the time had come to ease the unprecedented peacetime restrictions and rescue an economy in free-fall. However, he warned that the infection rate would spiral if France moved too swiftly and people became complacent. “We must protect the French people without paralysing France to the point that it collapses,” Philippe said. “A little too much carefreeness and the epidemic takes off again. Too much prudence and the whole country buckles.”
