{"id":126416,"date":"2021-03-31T18:38:04","date_gmt":"2021-03-31T22:38:04","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/antiguanewsroom.com\/?p=126416"},"modified":"2021-03-31T18:38:04","modified_gmt":"2021-03-31T22:38:04","slug":"france-returns-to-lockdown-as-vaccinations-lag","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/antiguanewsroom.com\/france-returns-to-lockdown-as-vaccinations-lag\/","title":{"rendered":"France returns to Lockdown as Vaccinations Lag"},"content":{"rendered":"
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PARIS \u2014 After more than a year of lockdowns and months of a sputtering vaccination campaign, Europe\u2019s efforts to curb the coronavirus pandemic suffered another setback on Wednesday as President Emmanuel Macron of France announced the start of a third national lockdown in a desperate move to halt a new deadly wave.<\/p>

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With infections surging, hospitals swelling with patients and the virus now reaching into classrooms, Mr. Macron effectively abandoned a monthslong gamble to keep France open in the hope that a steady pace of vaccinations would make a lockdown unnecessary. He said that restrictions currently covering about one-third of the country\u2019s population would be extended nationwide for four weeks starting Saturday, and that schools would be closed for at least three weeks.<\/p>\n

As the tally of coronavirus deaths pushed relentlessly close to the 100,000 mark, and with the highly transmissible variant first detected in Britain now accounting for two-thirds of France\u2019s new infections, Mr. Macron gave in to scientists and opposition politicians who had been pressing for a lockdown in recent weeks, and joined the list of European nations already hunkering down before the virus.<\/p>

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About three-quarter of Italy\u2019s population is\u00a0barred from going outside<\/a>\u00a0except for work, health or other essentials. Germany has also imposed a partial lockdown, with varying degrees of restrictions depending on the region, while Poland closed all nonessential shops and switched most of its schools to remote learning.<\/p>

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