Protective equipment, including 74 million FFP2 masks, will arrive via an air bridge between the two countries.

Health care workers, law enforcement and other professions essential to the smooth running of the country denounce a recurrent lack of protective equipment, while the coronavirus epidemic is still raging in France. To fill this gap, the French government has ordered a total of one billion masks from China.

To transport the equipment, an air bridge, composed of 56 rotations, will be set up between France and China. A device in which “Air France participates” confirmed the airline to the public media. Four Russian Antonov aircraft will be chartered each week, each carrying 18.3 million masks, continues the public media. Of the 1 billion masks in the total order, 74 million are of the FFP2 type, which is what the staff most exposed to the coronavirus needs.

The executive under pressure

Before being transported to France, the equipment will be concentrated in the Chinese cities of Shenzhen and Shanghai, then arrive in France within 48 hours. When they arrive on French soil, they will be distributed in French public health home warehouses located in Marolles (Loir-et-Cher), Blanquefort (Gironde), Vatry (Marne), Longueau (Somme), Allauch (Bouches-du-Rhône) and Chaponnay (Rhône).

In recent days, the political opposition, as well as a number of professions widely involved during the crisis, have denounced the lack of sanitary facilities available to them. Some also asserted their right to withdraw “If the means of protection are lacking in the services, the police will only carry out the really urgent missions and will no longer carry out containment control”, warned Thursday: all police unions. This Saturday, three truckers’ unions deplore a “lack of masks, gloves and hydroalcoholic gel” and call on drivers to exercise their “individual” right to withdraw as of Monday if the “breaches” persist.