France starts distributing AstraZeneca vaccine euractiv.com - get the latest breaking news, showbiz & celebrity photos, sport news & rumours, viral videos and top stories from euractiv.com Daily Mail and Mail on Sunday newspapers.
After testimonies of clandestine restaurant openings were shared across social media over the past few days, Economy Minister Bruno Le Maire told RTL in an interview Monday morning that if restaurants were to serve customers again, they would first be deprived of solidarity funds for the month.
“It’s extremely hard for restaurant owners, morally and economically,” he acknowledged. However, “that does not justify not respecting the rules, which are sanitary rules,” the minister added.
The government should hear this “cry of distress”, the secretary-general of France’s union of hospitality trades and industries, Frédéric Jeanjean, told France Info on Monday. “They should tell me things clearly and tell us that we’ll be here for three months or six months so that we’ll still have visibility,” said the trade unionist.
“The curfew and all the measures are certainly useful but probably insufficient”, Health Minister Olivier Véran said during the now traditional government update on the health situation on Thursday evening, adding that the new variants should be considered “as new viruses requiring new measures to protect us”.
For several weeks, the British variant has been circulating in France, particularly in the Paris region, where it is said to affect nearly 14% of all positive COVID-19 tests.
However, the government is still allowing itself to reflect for a few more days as it will decide “over the weekend”, government spokesperson Gabriel Attal told France Info in an interview. While maintaining the current set-up seems “unlikely”, imposing a “very tight lockdown” is nevertheless possible, Attal added.
BERLIN
Spahn considering changes to Germany’s vaccination plan. German Health Minister Jens Spahn (CDU) is weighing possible changes to the country’s vaccination schedule after media reports stated that the vaccine from AstraZeneca – set to be approved by the European Medical Agency (EMA) this week – was only 8% effective for those over 65 – a claim the company, as well as German health authorities, have denied. Read more.
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EU PRESIDENCY
EU must not lose ‘momentum’ for dialogue offered by Biden, Portugal says. Portugal’s Foreign Minister Augusto Santos Silva told EU lawmakers on Tuesday (26 January) that the bloc should not lose the new momentum offered by Joe Biden’s administration to relaunch dialogue with the United States. More.
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This week: we speak with Green MEP Eleonora Evi about the differences between the EU Parliament and the Commission when it comes to genetically modified crops, EURACTIV’s agrifood team explores the timeline for the common agricultural policy (CAP) and talk about a controversial new ‘protectionist’ amendment which was passed by the Czech Parliament this week.
18 - CAP developments, protectionism, GM crops
The European Commission is doing its utmost to include as much of the EU’s Green Deal in the Common Agricultural Policy (CAP) as it can, becoming a protagonist of the talks for its reform.