Paris to enter four-week lockdown as France faces third Covid wave

New restrictions for capital and northern parts of country from Friday as virulent variants spread

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The French government has imposed a month-long lockdown on Paris and parts of northern France after a faltering vaccine rollout and spread of highly contagious coronavirus variants forced the president, Emmanuel Macron, to shift course.

Since late January, when he defied the calls of scientists and some in his government to lock down the country, Macron has said he would do whatever was needed to keep the euro zone's second-largest economy as open as possible. However, this week he ran out of options just as France and other European countries briefly suspended use of the Oxford/AstraZenca vaccine.