Tag Archives: Paris

“We are ready”: inside the Paris hospitals bracing for coronavirus

WITH the number of cases of Covid-19 doubling every three days in France, the capital is preparing for the worst. In the northern sector of Paris, all 26 beds in the intensive care unit of the Bichat-Claude Bernard hospital are full, and the wards that have been turned over to Covid-19 patients are filling up rapidly. The Paris hospital system works by overflow, and the next in line is the Lariboisière, near the Gare du Nord train station…

This article first appeared in The Guardian on 17 March 2020. To continue reading, click here.

Notes from underground

ON 3 November 1793, in the thick of The Terror, the porter of the disaffected Val-de-Grâce abbey in Paris took advantage of the general commotion to slip into a stairway that led into the network of tunnels under the capital, and set off in search of treasure…

This article first appeared in The Idler around 1 January 2018. To continue reading, subscribe here or hunt it down in WHSmiths or bookshops.