Paris (AFP)

Primary and nursery schools reopen Monday for a start that promises to be complex, between the ramp-up of tests wanted by the government and the maintenance of a strict health protocol that risks causing multiple closures of classes.

After three weeks of closure of all schools to fight against the Covid-19 epidemic, the government has decided to maintain its schedule: return to school this Monday for schoolchildren, while middle school and high school students continue to distance themselves until May 3, date on which they will be able to return to their establishments, often in half-gauge.

Objective: to hold ten weeks until the end of the school year, without this reopening worsening the dynamics of the epidemic, which remains at a high level.

For ten days, the number of patients in intensive care has been close to 6,000, a figure higher than that of the second wave in the fall.

"It is essential to bring the children back to school", hammered on LCI on Sunday the Minister of National Education, Jean-Michel Blanquer, believing that the institution "is not responsible in itself for the 'epidemic "and that schools are places" where barrier gestures are respected more "than elsewhere.

He must go Monday morning with President Emmanuel Macron to a school in Melun, for this return marked by a strict health protocol, source of uncertainty for parents, which provides for the closure of a class from the first confirmed case of Covid. among his students.

"It is a really very strict protocol which will inevitably lead to a not insignificant number of class closings", admitted Sunday Mr. Blanquer, who however prefers "a small minority of closed classes than all closed schools."

With this protocol already in place before the holidays, 11,272 classes had to close between March 29 and April 2, three times more than the previous week.

- Self-tests and vaccination -

Despite criticism from part of the medical profession and the fears of some teachers, the executive consistently defends its objective of keeping schools open to avoid an "educational air hole".

According to Unesco, France was the European country which closed its schools the least between March 2020 and March 2021 with 10 weeks of closure in total, against 28 in Germany and 47 in the United States.

After the computer bugs which slowed down the distance education platforms just before the holidays, Mr. Blanquer assured Sunday that there "should not be a problem" of connection for the start of the school year.

This recovery is acutely based on the issue of the vaccine: for ten days, only teachers over 55 years of age have reserved slots in vaccination centers.

In an attempt to calm distrust of AstraZeneca, Mr Blanquer received his first dose of the British vaccine on Saturday and publicly encourages priority personnel to be "vaccinated now"

With the return of sunny days, the government is also encouraging outdoor classes.

The organization of canteens, where children eat without a mask and which Mr. Blanquer recognizes as the "weak link" of establishments, promises to be complex.

Above all, the stake of this recovery is to massify the testing capacities for children and teachers.

In kindergartens and primary schools, 400,000 saliva tests must be deployed from the start of the school year, with a target of 600,000 per week by mid-May.

But the novelty lies mainly in the arrival of self-tests: the government has ordered 64 million for students over 15 years, teachers and other staff of National Education.

Adults should take this simple nasal swab twice a week at home, the result of which is known in fifteen minutes.

From May 10, high school students will be subjected to it every week in their establishment, which already worries some teachers, who do not feel competent to supervise the operation.

"It is normal that there are questions," tempered Mr. Blanquer.

However, he sees in these tests, which could soon be extended to college students, "a considerable progress".

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