France set to reduce COVID variant sequencing capacity -France Inter radio

France is set to reduce from next week its capacity to carry out sequencing of COVID-19 infections, just as the epidemic is soaring in China and the European Union asked member states to step up sequencing, France Inter radio said on Friday. From Dec. 31, six out of the eight sequencing platforms that have been conducting COVID surveillance for the French Health Ministry would stop doing so, France Inter said.

The Health Ministry did not immediately reply to a request for comment but it told France Inter that the monitoring process would be lightened but that sequencing would still be carried out by a network of labs in France.