|
 President Emmanuel Macron said a return to school would help fight
social inequality, allowing parents who struggle to pay for
childcare to get back to work, but trade unions warned that new
infections would lead to a "torrent" of classroom closures.
In the upmarket Paris suburb of Neuilly-sur-Seine, pupils wore face
masks and rubbed disinfectant gel on their hands as they filed
through the front door of the Achille Peretti primary school. A
poster reminded the youngsters to stay a metre apart.
"They're young, they need an adult to help them, but most parents
have a job and it's burdensome to ask them to do the school work,"
said teacher Elodie Passon.
Middle and high school pupils are due to return to the classroom
next Monday, when the government will also lift domestic travel
restrictions that have been in place nationwide since early April.
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 The open-air terraces of bars
and restaurants, as well as some business and
cultural venues, might be allowed to reopen from
mid-May if the curbs have sufficiently slowed
the spread of the coronavirus, the government
has said. Some doctors and
public health experts have warned it may be too early to ease
restrictions.
On Sunday, the seven-day average of new cases fell below 30,000 for
the first time in over a month, from about 38,000 when the lockdown
began, though the number of COVID-19 patients in critical care still
hovered near a third-wave high of 5,984.
(Reporting by Yiming Woo, writing by Richard Lough, editing by
Estelle Shirbon)
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