Paris (AFP)

Mass screenings will be carried out in four metropolises before and after Christmas, a first in France, to improve the “test-alert-protect” strategy but which will remain based on volunteering, Minister of Health Olivier Véran announced on Thursday.

These operations will take place in the metropolitan areas of Le Havre and Charleville-Mézières from December 14 to 19, then in Roubaix and Saint-Etienne around January 11, said Olivier Véran, while the government had previously mentioned three operations.

They should be based on ephemeral screening sites, screenings in large companies or schools, according to details that had been provided earlier by the town halls.

"These operations are organized hand in hand with the local authorities, in conjunction with the prefects and regional health agencies", assured Mr. Véran, indicating that the "vulnerable groups" and "the public most exposed to the cluster risks ".

"We do not have the obligation in France to be tested (...) it is not possible in France", but "we will encourage it", he added, without giving an objective number of people tested.

"If the tests are positive", it will be a question of "setting up immediate + contact tracing + (preventing contact cases) and guaranteeing good conditions for sheltering positive patients", added the Minister.

"These operations are as much a means of limiting the spread of the virus in the communities concerned, as a lever of experimentation for our test-alert-protect strategy, which you can see evolves, that it will continue to evolve as that we will learn how to deal with this pandemic, ”he explained.

Emmanuel Macron had indicated at the end of October that this system put in place to stop the epidemic was no longer effective beyond a few thousand cases per day.

The number of new daily cases is now around 10,000 people.

Epidemiologists have long called for these mass screenings to make the testing strategy more effective.

© 2020 AFP