A first test concert was organized on Saturday in Paris, with the Indochine group on stage.

5,000 masked and tested people were gathered in a closed room for a real scientific experiment and to study the safety of the protocol.

But France is lagging behind.

In Spain or the United Kingdom, the experiment was carried out several months ago.

DECRYPTION

Live music and fans gathered in a pit, the scene had not been seen in France for almost a year and a half.

On Saturday, a first test concert was organized at the AccorHotels Arena, in Paris Bercy.

On stage: Etienne de Crécy, then Indochine.

The 5,000 spectators had to wear a mask and had previously performed an antigen test.

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The scientific experiment, carried out by the AP-HP and the Prodiss (main live performance union), aims to test the viability of the protocol and to see if it is possible to participate again in this kind of event. without risking contamination.

To find out if the virus has circulated, all spectators will be tested again within a week.

Oh, a pit!

Étienne de Crecy's concert, which provides the first part of Indochina, should start in about fifteen minutes pic.twitter.com/FBkZD8F1pZ

- Angèle Chatelier (@Angele_c) May 29, 2021

"We should have done it much earlier"

"We should have done it much earlier, before canceling all these festivals. I do not see the difference to do it now or before", estimated on Europe 1 the French producer Jackie Lombard (Madonna, Celine Dion or Coldplay ). Indeed, this test concert arrives later in France. In Spain or the United Kingdom, the experiment was launched more than six months ago. The health protocols were also satisfactory since they allowed the Spaniards to offer volunteers to relive a full festive evening in a street of cafes, concerts and nightclubs near Barcelona at the end of May. Here again, a negative test had to be provided and the concerned were followed up week after week.

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"If we could have done this in March, we would certainly have saved time"

The tests and the wearing of the mask are essential devices to put in place the next conditions for the resumption of nightlife. But according to the virologist Constance de Logeurs, who herself developed the French experiment, France is largely lagging behind: "We would perhaps have liked to do all this before, so that the deconfinement opens very quickly on a recovery. If we had been able to do that in March, we would certainly have saved time. The deconfinement authorizes from July a resumption of standing concerts, but with a distance of four meters, so that is to say not at all what we are going to evaluate, ”she explains on Europe 1.

The English are so far ahead that they have already tried to remove the mask during a test concert in Liverpool at the beginning of May. For their part, the Spaniards will meet in festival standing in Catalonia in July, with nearly 25,000 people gathered. French virologists ask them for patience: they are working for next fall.