France said on Sunday it expected to evacuate hundreds of its citizens from the Wuhan area in China, the epicentre of a coronavirus outbreak.
French Health Minister Agnes Buzyn said any decision to ban flights from China would have to be taken by the European Union and rejected calls for temperature screening of passengers flying in from China as ineffectual.
France expects to repatriate up to a few hundred of its 800 citizens living in the Wuhan area. Evacuees will have to spend 14 days in quarantine to avoid spreading the virus in France.