Paris (AFP)

Roxana Maracineanu, Minister in charge of Sports, said Wednesday that a mask intended for sport was being studied in order to be able to practice in safety, subject, once created, to its validation by the health authorities.

During a videoconference with the sports sector organized by Medef, the minister was questioned on this subject of a "barrier mask" by Virgile Caillet, general delegate of the Union sport et cycle (USC) who deplores the definitive closure of "400 sports halls", because of the pandemic.

"This work around the sports mask is in itself a great step forward, it is a cooperation between Decathlon, USC and the Ministry of Sports", replied the Minister.

"We have made a financial investment so that Afnor can develop this standard which will allow manufacturers to position themselves on the manufacture of this mask", she detailed.

This "will have to find a balance between breathability and the necessary protection", she added.

"I can only support an initiative like this one, because it is a tool for returning to sport, which will allow sports halls in particular to be able to reopen" and their users to be "protected as when we go in a store or in transport ".

It "will have to be validated by the High Council for Public Health, by the Ministry of Health," said the minister.

She gave no indication of the timetable, neither on the mask, nor on the prospects for reopening the rooms, but insisted on the fact that "sport is an essential activity for the health of the French".

Only the practice of sport outdoors is currently authorized but reduced to nothing in the evening due to the general curfew at 6 p.m.

Gyms and swimming pools have been closed since the end of October to adults, and minors since last week, after a very brief recovery at the end of November for outdoors and December 15 indoors.

The sports halls have been closed for several months.

In a letter to the Prime Minister, Senator LR from Isère Michel Savin, and 72 senators from the majority, asked Wednesday "that an exemption from the curfew after 6 p.m. be authorized for the practice of an individual physical activity of open air and without regrouping as soon as possible and for all French ".

"The situation is incomprehensible whereas during the previous confinements and curfew, it was always possible for the French to practice a physical activity in the open air", write these senators.

© 2021 AFP