France’s prime minister has defended new nationwide measures to combat a resurgent coronavirus in France that include closing schools for at least three weeks and putting in place a month-long domestic travel ban, saying the government has acted “consistently and pragmatically”.

The National Assembly, France’s lower house, voted to approve the new measures by 348-9 after opposition parties boycotted the vote en masse, according to AP.

Jean-Luc Melenchon of the leftist La France Insoumise party denounced the vote as a “bad April fool’s”. Dismissing the measures as half-baked, he urged President Emmanuel Macron to increase vaccine supplies and adopt a more effective vaccine strategy.