Lunchtime News Thursday 18th February 2021

News

France’s Health Minister to visit Nice on Saturday - The prefect of the Alpes-Maritimes has announced this morning on French media that France’s Health Minister Olivier Veran is to visit Nice this Saturday the 20th February. The visit from the minister comes as Nice currently has the highest incidence rate for Covid in France.

Six additional deaths from Covid in the Alpes Maritimes - Meanwhile the Regional Health Agency announced six new deaths from Covid on Wednesday 17th February in hospitals in the Alpes Maritimes with 320 people hospitalised the lowest figure since the beginning of February. 107 people are currently in intensive care in the department and 224 clusters are currently under investigation in the Alpes Maritimes, 17 more than last week.

Fire destroys bar restaurant in Frejus - A fire has broken out at the Kazaar bar restaurant on Boulevard de la Liberation in Fréjus in the Var. Firefighters were on site in the early hours of this morning to battle the blaze which has destroyed more than half of the 400m2 establishment. A police investigation is underway to determine the cause of the fire.

Fighter plane hits electricy line leaving 400 people without power - The town of Le Castellet has been left without electricity for more than four hours after a fighter plane hit an electricity line causing damage and leading to the power cut. The incident occurred on Wednesday afternoon when two fighter planes, left the air base in the Vaucluse and flew over the village of Le Castellet. 400 people were left without electricity and for security reasons the access road to the town was closed. An investigation has been opened.

2 hours 25 minutes a day surfing the internet - An annual report published by Médiamétrie has shown that in 2020 on average the French spent 2 hours and 25 minutes a day surfing the internet, 19 minutes more than in 2019. The increase concerned all categories of the population but was strongest amongst 15-24-year olds who spent 4 hours and 23 minutes a day on the internet last year. According to Médiamétrie, the leap in the use of the Internet reflects the acceleration of digitization in all areas of our daily lives, from health care to education, teleworking, online shopping, messaging and video calls. Facebook remains number one with its number of monthly visitors increasing by 3% to 45.2 million. Three other of its services (WhatsApp, Instagram and Messenger) rank behind it in the "top 10" of the most used messaging and social networks in France. TikTok is in 9th place with 11 million monthly visitors, a jump of 273% but it is still far behind Snapchat which remains the network most used by young people.

And Finally

An Australian leading science commentator has revealed that drinking alcohol or being slightly drunk can make the opposite sex more attractive. Dr Karl recently joined TikTok to answer common scientific questions. His latest query is why people suddenly become more attractive when you're drunk.

The scientist highlighted a study done in 2003 on heterosexual university students and whether alcohol affected their perceptions of reality and their opinions on the attractiveness of other people.

And when it came to rating the attractiveness of other people, women found men a bit more attractive, but men found women a whole lot more attractive.' He said they called this an increase in the 'Facial Attractiveness Index', or what we might call 'beer goggles'.