- A coronavirus epidemic has declared in China with the city of Wuhan as its epicenter.
- In Paris, the Chinese community is generally not very worried. She prefers to focus on preparing for the Chinese New Year.
The coronavirus seems far away this Wednesday afternoon, at the premises of the association of Chinese residents in France, rue du Temple in Paris (4th). The excitement that reigns there is more focused on the preparation of the Chinese New Year which begins on January 25 and will be marked on Sunday by the traditional parade.
"We are in France and it is far from China, there is no worry", explains an official, while a dozen young girls repeat a choreography near rickshaws, dragons in colored papers and masks. “This epidemic is far from France, reassures Jean-Pierre Chen, vice-president of the association. Do not panic, it has nothing to do with 2003. And I trust the Chinese state to protect us. "
"Chinese TV news talks a lot about it"
In Belleville, one of the neighborhoods of the Chinese community, the coronavirus does not scare much more. "We are not really worried," replied a local from the Chinese association of France - French of China. I have nothing more to say except that you are the fifth journalist to ask me the question. In a Chinese restaurant not far from there, a young waitress sweeps away all anxiety: "What is in China is in China. My parents live there but they didn't tell me about it at all. "
Our file on the coronavirus
At the neighboring optical store, we do not give in to more panic, even if "Chinese television news talks a lot about it". The seller of "Bonjour Pâtisserie" has a theory about the low concern generated by this epidemic of coronavirus: "The people of the neighborhood are not from the region of Wuhan [where the epidemic started], but from Zhejiang, southeast of Shanghai, so they're not directly affected. A little further down, on avenue Jean-Jaurès, in the La Boîte à fleurs shop, a young mother recalls that her father returned to China a few days ago for Chinese New Year, without much worry about the flu virus. There will always be time to worry later.
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