France bolsters homeworking rules to stem Covid-19 surge

France will require homeworking for all eligible employees for at least three days a week and ban large indoor gatherings of more than 2,000 people as it seeks to curb a new wave of Covid-19 driven largely by the highly transmissible Omicron variant.

Jean Castex, the prime minister, also promised that a law to make vaccination all-but compulsory would take effect by mid-January by accelerating an earlier timetable to convert the “health pass” used for access to bars, restaurants and other public places into a “vaccine pass”. If the law is passed by parliament then people would no longer be allowed entry to such places with only a negative Covid-19 test.

But the government stopped short of imposing other strict new measures such as a curfew or delaying the return to school after the Christmas holidays, ignoring calls from some public health experts in recent days that bolder action was needed.

“We are in a race against the clock,” Castex said at a press conference, adding that the government’s strategy was to impose “proportionate” responses as the epidemic evolved.

“Even if we do not yet see hospitals as overloaded by Omicron, the contagiousness of the variant and the speed at which it is spreading require us to go further,” he said.

Countries across Europe have been reimposing restrictions on life and business in recent weeks as they battle a wave of Covid-19 infections. The region now accounts for a third of cases and a third of deaths globally, according to the World Health Organization.

France logged almost 105,000 new infections on December 25, the highest level since the pandemic began, which took its incidence rate to 712, a third higher than only a week ago. Some of that was down to much higher testing levels as people took precautions before holiday gatherings but the spread is also likely being driven by the more transmissible Omicron variant that experts estimate already accounts for the majority of infections in Paris.

President Emmanuel Macron’s government has so far preferred not to impose broad curbs on businesses that would damage the economic recovery. Instead it has advocated the faster rollout of booster vaccines and taken smaller steps such as making homeworking required as opposed to simply recommended, as it was before.

Castex said the new homeworking rule would be discussed with unions and employers’ organisations on Tuesday, and would last at least three weeks. It has been estimated that roughly four out of 10 French jobs can be performed remotely.

Other measures he announced included a rule that bans consumption of food and drinks on long-distance transport and in cinemas and theatres to prevent people from removing their masks. Bars and restaurants will be required to provide only table service.

Some said the government had not gone far enough. “The health system has lost out in the arbitrage with the economy today,” said Jean-Paul Stahl, an infectious disease specialist at a Grenoble hospital, on BFM TV.

Whether further new policies will be needed in the coming weeks will depend on whether French hospitals can cope with higher admissions over Christmas and afterwards. Its hospitals have been under pressure from staff shortages and absenteeism even before the full impact of Omicron. Deaths reached 1,050 in the past week — a level not seen since last April — to take the overall death toll to more than 122,500.