FRANCOIS - REPORT FROM ALSACE

We are indeed experiencing an unpredictable situation, when the largest part of the public and economic activity is stopped, and not only in one country (like it could be shortly after a terrorist attack) but everywhere and more or less at the same time. In any of the business continuity plans I had to draft in the European Parliament after 2001, I would imagine, nobody in fact would imagine, such a dramatic situation of a general lockdown. 

I have a feeling of something surrealistic asking me sometimes if we had the appropriate reaction. The number of deaths lies today by 3500 in France. It will no doubt increase ; there are more than 12000 in Italy. A normal influenza kills every year in France around 8000 people and one estimates that the deaths caused by the dog days in 2003 were around 19 490 in France and 20 089 in Italy. What is new this time is that there are no remedies, neither preventive, nor curative, against that virus which can strike by surprise. Scientists say it is not transmitted by the air but by personal contact : your friend becomes your enemy! 

So the natural reaction was to avoid any contact, to shelter oneself, to avoid any risk. Mutatis mutandi, that’s what the states did, even at a local level, by isolating people, villages, towns and finally countries. Although some, like President Macron, use the war vocabulary, it is outside the normal understanding of the political leaders ; the doctors and scientists have taken the lead, the governments follow! They also follow an example coming from Wuhan, in the “democratic” China. There is a lot to comment. 

To come closer to our daily lives, I am glad to notice and to stress that the German - French solidarity has been finally activated. The firsts reaction was to close the German frontier, a normal reaction of fear and self-protection as mentioned earlier. It didn’t last very long because Baden, Freiburg, Karlsruhe,... rely on Alsatian workers crossing everyday the Rhine. 

The French side reacted similarly, in the national framework, with a national strategy, considering the transfer of patients to other regions of France rather than to near Germany! I am several times a week in contact with a friend managing the daily aspects of the Franco-German relations on both sides between Alsace, Baden and Süd-Pfalz and I am supporting actively his efforts to enhance the bilateral cooperation. He is one of those who drew the attention on neighbourhood solidarity. What a better opportunity than the present situation?

 Paris hadn’t thought to ask for the German support. Comprehensive attitude, they thought Germany would never preempt their hospital’s capacity. We presume of a nationalist, selfish, reaction without even trying. A friend from Munich,this afternoon, reported me the same reaction between Bayern and Süd-Tyrol. Presently, finally, the European solidarity between neighbours is active, be it between Bayern and Sud-Tirol or between Baden and Alsace, French Moselle and Saarland. We even saw a German plane landing in Strasbourg to take on bord French patients to bring them into an hospital in Stuttgart. 

I can witness that Europe, once again, is active thanks to personal relations between political and administrative leaders, on a daily scale and in the proximity. Germany has an advantage in that situation, its federal system. The health politic is a regional competence and even more, public hospitals are under the supervision of cities. 

Today we had been invited, my wife and myself, to the inauguration of the “Forum am Rhein”, a kind of business center including a theatre and a restaurant, built directly on the German side of the Pierre-Pflimlin bridge on the Rhine. A true symbol of German-French friendship. Because of the virus it is postponed, as are all my activities, be it as the ambassador of the Sovereign Order of Malta to the Council of Europe (down locked as all European institutions), or as the animator of the Cercle européen de STRASBOURG, the diplomatic club, or as the chair of a think tank on the values of religions in building Europe (www.decere.eur). It is probably the latter which we will have to reactivate first in order to re-think on the common values to promote after the present experience. 

Francois,

Alsace, France  -  31 03 2020