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| 'There are worse places' for a two-week quarantine, says Marc Ziltman, the Red Cross chief on site (AFP Photo/GERARD JULIEN) |
Carry-le-Rouet (France) (AFP) - Twice a day they will have their temperature taken and nurses will check them for coronavirus symptoms: other than that, their main concern will be how to keep their phone charged and get their laundry done.
The 179
evacuees -- mostly made up of French nationals and their Chinese spouses --
flown back from China were settling into their new life in quarantine on
Saturday. A holiday resort in the southeast of France that will be their home
for the next two weeks.
These
special guests will have the run of their seaside base in Carry-le-Rouet, about
30 kilometres (19 miles) from the Mediterranean port city of Marseille -- so
long as they wear a mask.
On
Saturday, their first morning there, some were up to take in the sunrise,
others sat outside in the mild weather reading while others explored inside the
hotel complex.
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By Saturday
morning, the day after their arrival, residents were already sitting
outside
enjoying the mild Mediterranean weather (AFP Photo/Hector RETAMAL)
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"There
are worse places," said Marc Ziltman with a smile, as children's shouts
echoed across the facility.
"The
easy solution would have been a disused barracks," Zilman, the senior Red
Cross official on site, pointed out. Instead, the French authorities opted to
make the evacuees stay as comfortable as possible.
"The
site needs to be as agreeable as possible because people are going to pass 14
days there," he told AFP.
Gendarme
patrols
There is
volleyball for the teenagers, art classes for the toddlers and a space for the
grown-ups to relax over a coffee, making it more holiday resort than hospital
or clinic.
For the moment,
no one here has shown any symptoms that could indicate they have caught the new
coronavirus. Two possible cases identified as the evacuees came off their plane
on Friday tested negative at La Timone hospital in Marseille.
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While the
evacuees have the run of the resort, they have to wear masks and
stay on site
(AFP Photo/Hector RETAMAL)
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The medical
team looking after the evacuees is about 20 strong, including doctors, nurses
and psychologists. Backing them are are soldiers from France's civil security
units and 30 Red Cross volunteers, who mainly take care of the logistics of
their stay.
On their
first day back on Saturday, the new arrivals got down to solving the immediate
challenges raised by their rather hasty repatriation: how to do their laundry,
change their Chinese currency and get hold of cigarettes.
A concierge
service was already up and running to attend to their needs.
"Yesterday,
they were tired, which is quite normal," said Zyltman. They had their
evening meal and went quietly to bed. "Now, life is back on course and
it's going rather well," he added.
As the
special guests got their bearings, members of France's paramilitary gendarme
force patrolled the site, keeping careful guard at the resort's only access
point.
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Two
suspected cases of coronavirus were tested when they got off the plane
from
China, but both tested negative (AFP Photo/Hector RETAMAL)
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But they
are in any case at a fairly isolated site, in the middle of a pine forest, in a
cove more than 3 kilometres from the seaside village of Carry-le-Rouet itself.
The parents
of a student flown back from China were already outside, having come to deliver
him a travel bag with clean clothes. They had to leave it with the gendarmes at
the entrance.
But the
father seemed reassured that their son was being looked after in France.
Their son
had described the atmosphere there as "fairly convivial", he said.
"I
think they are all relieved to be there, in very good conditions, he told the
journalists gathered outside.
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