France will widen strict lockdown restrictions – which have already been in place in several areas including Paris – to the whole country to combat a third wave of coronavirus sweeping Europe.

In a televised address to the nation, President Emmanuel Macron said the measures will come into effect on Saturday and be in place for at least a month.

He described the measures as “reinforced breaking” and they will include closing non-essential shops, and shutting schools for three weeks.

He said timetables will be adapted to allow for one week of online lessons.

There will be a month-long domestic travel ban, and a nationwide 7pm-6am curfew will remain in place.

Mr Macron said “we will lose control if we do not move now”, adding “the epidemic is accelerating”.

The extended measures mark a departure from the government’s policy in recent months, which has focused on regionalised restrictions.

School closures in particular had been seen as a very last resort.

His announcement comes after doctors warned that hospitals are on the brink of being overwhelmed by the number of sick people needing treatment.

Daily new infections have doubled since February to nearly 40,000.

And yesterday, the number of COVID-19 patients in intensive care breached 5,000, exceeding the peak hit during a six-week long lockdown in the autumn.

Sky’s Europe correspondent Adam Parsons said of the president’s address: “This really was a classic bit of Emmanuel Macron rhetoric. It was a speech laced with care, with politics and also with a little grain of self-aggrandisement.”

He said that the measures announced are “pretty much the pillars of the lockdown of last year”.

Mr Macron had been holding off another national lockdown since the start of the year, hoping to steer France out of the pandemic while giving the economy a chance to recover from a deep slump.

However, in recent weeks, options have narrowed as the highly contagious and virulent coronavirus variant first detected in Britain has swept across France and much of Europe.

Ten days ago, the government shut non-essential stores and limited people’s movements in Paris and other regions ravaged by the virus.

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