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Editor in Chief Mohamed Wadie

France to Impose Quarantines on Arrivals from UAE, Turkey, More


Fri 07 May 2021 | 04:55 PM
Omnia Ahmed

France ordered a mandatory 10-day quarantine for arrivals from seven additional countries in a bid to curb the coronavirus pandemic, a government source told AFP on Friday.

Turkey is now on the extended quarantine list coming into force at midnight on Saturday, in addition to Bangladesh, Sri Lanka, Pakistan, Nepal, the United Arab Emirates and Qatar, the source said.

In the same vein, French President Emmanuel Macron affirmed that he was “absolutely in favour” of a global waiver on patent protection for Covid-19 vaccines.

Macron asserted Friday that he was ready to discuss waiving the vaccine patents but more important was the US and UK ending export restrictions on vaccines and their raw materials.

"Today, the Anglo-Saxons block many of these ingredients and vaccines," he told reporters as he arrived at a summit in the Portuguese city of Porto. "Today 100 percent of the vaccines produced in the United States are for the American market."

The French President’s statement marked a shift for France, which had previously opposed such a move as likely to discourage innovation and argued patents should only be waived as a last resort.

Meantime, the number of new COVID-19 infections in France is rising much more slowly and hospitalization declined on Wednesday, in the first week after the government eased its third nationwide lockdown.