Covid-19: 54,000 anti-pass demonstrators this Saturday, sharp decline in mobilization

Antipass and antivax mobilization in sharp decline. Demonstrations by opponents of the health pass and anti-vaccine gathered 54,000 participants across France this Saturday, according to the Ministry of the Interior. That is almost twice less than last week (105,200), which had been marked by a very clear rebound in mobilization. In Paris, four processions mobilized 7,000 people, including 5,800 at the rally organized by the Patriots of Florian Philippot, and four people were arrested, according to the ministry. In the rest of the country, 47,000 demonstrators and six arrests were recorded.

Djokovic, antipass icon. “Resistant Djokovic”, “Freedom”, “No to the vaccine”: the opponents of the health pass, which will become a vaccination pass, demonstrated this Saturday in France, making the Serbian tennis player a symbol of their mobilization. In Paris, the most important procession was that of the Les Patriotes movement, of the pro-Frexit presidential candidate Florian Philippot. He started around 3 p.m. from the Trocadéro. The speakers at the podium made the crowd chant “Freedom Djokovic” , in Serbian: encouragement for the tennis champion that the Australian government does not want to let enter its soil for the Australian Open because he is not vaccinated.

In Paris, many French flags, regional flags – Corsican, Breton… – and a few fleur-de-lys banners floated in the wind. Some demonstrators claimed to belong to far-right movements such as the Catholic fundamentalists of Civitas. Most of the banners displayed hostility to both the pass and the vaccines themselves: “It’s not a virus they want to control, it’s you”in Paris, or “Democracy in Danger” , “Toxic vaccine” in Rennes… This Saturday, the demonstrators were 1,300 in Lyon, 1,140 in Nantes, 1,000 in Bordeaux, 950 in Rennes, 750 in Marseille, 650 in Clermont-Ferrand, according to the police or the prefectures.

A case of omicron detected in Beijing three weeks before the games. This is the scenario that the authorities have done everything to avoid: a case of transmission of the omicron variant has been detected in the capital, where the Winter Olympics are to open on February 4. The case was discovered in the Haidian district, where many tech company headquarters are located, a rare breach in Beijing’s tight defenses against Covid-19. Authorities are testing other occupants of the residential compound and office building, and have restricted access to 17 locations linked to the infected person. Beijing has long been closed to people from parts of the country where cases have been reported and is asking all arrivals to provide recent Covid-19 tests.

This announcement comes after Zhuhai, a coastal city of 2.4 million inhabitants in the south-east of the country, near Macao, imposed travel restrictions, following the discovery of seven cases of contamination by the omicron variant. Millions of Chinese have been ordered to stay home in recent weeks, dozens of domestic flights have been canceled and entire factories closed as authorities seek to stem the outbreak ahead of the Olympics.

A vaccination center reopens in front of the town hall of Paris. Operated by the French Red Cross as part of a partnership between the city of Paris, the Ile-de-France Regional Health Agency (ARS) and the police headquarters, the vaccination center is open every day from 10 a.m. to 8 p.m., with or without an appointment, except for 5-11 year olds. This center will be able to vaccinate up to 1,500 people per day and “the capacity will be gradually increased to reach 2,500 to 3,000 injections per day, if necessary”, said the mayor of Paris.

Omicron expands to a new Chinese city, residents told to stay. The city of Zhuhai in southeastern China on Saturday suspended public bus routes after at least seven cases of omicron, the highly contagious variant of the coronavirus, were discovered and asked residents not to leave the city. This coastal city of 2.4 million inhabitants, which adjoins Macau, had already announced on Thursday the closure of hair salons, sports halls and cinemas in particular. These decisions were taken following the discovery of a mild illness and six positive but asymptomatic patients during a massive campaign of tests, following a case discovered in the neighboring city of Zhongshan.

A positive November 13 acknowledgment. One of the defendants in the trial of the November 13 attacks, who presented symptoms of Covid-19 in court on Friday, tested positive. Ali El Haddad Asufi, one of the eleven accused appearing detained, was “self-tested” Friday evening which turned out to be positive, indicates the president of the special assize court of Paris, Jean-Louis Périès, in a message sent to the lawyers. The resumption of the trial on Tuesday seems compromised.

The vaccination pass applicable “at the end of the week”. The LREM president of the Assembly’s law commission, Yaël Braun-Pivet, said on France Info this Saturday morning that the measure should “probably come into force before ten days”: “We will see how the debates take place in the Senate and if there is a referral to the Constitutional Council. In any case, the text will normally be adopted definitively tomorrow. It could be, I think, applicable at the end of the week. […] For two years, we have been going from surprise to surprise, we must not let our guard down.

More than 500,000 disabled health passes? From this Saturday, the health pass must be deactivated for people who have not had a booster dose at most seven months after the last injection. This theoretically concerns 560,000 French people, according to the latest estimates communicated Friday evening by the Ministry of Health. Nevertheless, among these people, many are those “who have presented an infection and who have not yet put proof of their infection in their Tous Anti Covid system”, estimated the Minister of Health, Olivier Véran, two days ago.

The vaccination pass adopted at second reading. The deputies adopted without surprise the controversial bill transforming the health pass into a vaccine pass at second reading, Saturday, after a night of debates which will continue in a few hours in the Senate. Started at 3 p.m. on Friday, the second reading of the text, involving the examination of nearly 450 amendments, ended around 4 a.m. on Saturday with an adoption by 185 votes for, 69 against and 8 abstentions, in an electric atmosphere. This is the latest stage in a parliamentary marathon that began on December 29 in committee, and which will end on Sunday afternoon with a final vote by the National Assembly, after a chaotic course marked by hiccups , controversies and twists.