The French cities of Lyon, Lille, Grenoble and Saint-Étienne will go on maximum coronavirus alert from Saturday, French Health Minister Olivier Véran said on Thursday.

Paris, Marseille and the overseas territory of Guadeloupe have also been put on maximum alert in recent weeks, leading to the closure of local bars and cafés.

Véran added that the situation in Toulouse and Montpellier was worrying and that those cities could also be moved to the maximum Covid-19 alert level starting early next week.

“The health situation in France, alas, is continuing to worsen,” he said. “Every day in France, more and more people are being infected, more and more are falling ill, and more and more are suffering serious effects that require hospitalisation.”

Véran’s announcement came shortly after officials reported 18,129 new Covid-19 infections on Thursday, with the daily tally staying above 18,000 for the second day running after Wednesday’s all-time high of 18,746.

The health minister urged the public to help fight the virus by wearing face masks and keeping a safe distance from others, even at home where there has been a concerning increase in the number of young people infecting older, more vulnerable family members.

Meanwhile, hospitals in the Paris region moved into emergency mode on Thursday, cancelling staff holidays and postponing non-essential operations, as coronavirus patients made up close to half of all patients in intensive care units (ICUs).

The number of people in hospital for Covid-19 stood at a three-month high of 7,624 on a national level, an increase of 88 over 24 hours. That total is still lower than an April 14 peak of 32,292 but up versus an August 29 low of 4,530.

There were 11 more patients in ICUs for the disease, making a tally of 1,427, almost four times higher than a July 31 low of 371.

The number of people in France who have died from Covid-19 rose by 76, a figure higher than the seven-day moving average of 73, and now stands at 32,521.

(FRANCE 24 with AFP, REUTERS)

As many as 115 million people could be pushed into extreme poverty this year due to the economic downturn caused by the coronavirus pandemic, the World Bank warned Wednesday.

That is a devastating reversal after decades of progress, and higher than the bank previously estimated, even as recently as August, when the worst case was put at 100 million.

And the bank’s new report estimates that by 2021, 150 million could be living below the extreme poverty threshold of less than $1.90 a day.

“The pandemic and global recession may cause over 1.4 percent of the world’s population to fall into extreme poverty,” World Bank President David Malpass said in a statement.

If the pandemic had not struck, the global extreme poverty rate was expected to fall to 7.9 percent, but now could climb as high as 9.4 percent, the bank said in its flagship report.

World Bank economists say the dire estimates for new victims of poverty this year, which range from 88 million to 115 million, depend on the outlook for the global economy, which the Washington-based crisis lender estimates range from a contraction of five percent to eight percent in the worst case scenario.

That would erode years of success in reducing extreme poverty, and the authors warn create “poverty hotspots” in areas that face a double-hit from economic crisis and conflict: more than 40 percent of the poor live in conflict-affected areas.

The research also finds a rising share of those living in extreme poverty are in urban areas, which threatens to overwhelm existing support programs that are designed for rural populations.

A distant goal

Instead of achieving the goal of eradicating poverty by 2030, the convergence of the COVID-19 pandemic with the pressures of conflict and climate change will put the goal “beyond reach without swift, significant and substantial policy action,” the World Bank said, warning that the global poverty rate could be about seven percent in the next decade.

“In order to reverse this serious setback to development progress and poverty reduction, countries will need to prepare for a different economy post-COVID, by allowing capital, labor, skills, and innovation to move into new businesses and sectors,” Malpass said.

The bank said the policy response must be commensurate with the severity of the crisis, including modernizing education and online learning and deploying new technology to expand the reach of social protection programs.

“Failure to act comprehensively and urgently will create even bigger challenges in the future,” the authors warned.

Looking at a broader definition of poverty, the report found that close to a quarter of the world’s population lives below the $3.20 line and more than 40 percent — almost 3.3 billion people — live below the $5.50 line.

Sub-Saharan Africa remains the epicenter of the problem, and could see an additional 40 million people fall into extreme poverty this year, and move closer to 500 million next year, according to the report.

And climate change will drive 68 million to 135 million into poverty by 2030, with Sub-Saharan Africa again the most vulnerable.

Latin America could see an increase of five million in the worst case scenario, and East Asia an additional nine million. The report does not include estimates for South Asia given the lack of data from India.

(Source: Agencies)