Queer-friendly French nudist resort sees surge in coronavirus cases as more than 100 naturists test positive
Naturists walk on a beach in Cap D’Agde circa 1980 in Agde, France. (Sonia Moskowitz/Images/Getty)
Cap d’Agde, a nudist beach resort in France popular with the LGBT+ community, has seen a “very worrying” spike in coronavirus infections.
The beach on France’s Mediterranean coast is “part of Europe’s largest naturist resort and infamous for raunchy beach shenanigans”, according to one hotel.
The Cap d’Agde beach is unofficially divided into sections for families, libertines (or swingers) and gays, according to Tripadvisor reviews, and one beach-goer said: “Lots of fun being had in the water (mainly hetero) and in sand dunes (mainly gay).”
Alongside the beach is a huge circular building which houses the Cap d’Agde camp, a nudist village.
The naturist resort draws tens of thousands of people per day in the summer, with around 10 to 20 percent of visitors being LGBT+, according to LGBTQ Nation.
But this week, in two rounds of testing, 95 out of 490 people tested in Cap d’Agde had a positive result for COVID-19, an infection rate of 30 per cent.
A further 50 cases have been counted among visitors who have returned home, a spike that health officials are calling “very worrying”. Another round of tests is currently being analysed.
The Occitanie region health authority director general, Pierre Ricordeau, insisted that all visitors to the resort wear masks, even if they wear little else.
According to Reuters, Ricordeau said: “There are infections everywhere, including among people who are not libertines.
“The message is the same for everyone: wear a mask, wash your hands and practice social distancing, whether you are a libertine or not a libertine.”
Authorities in the region have ordered people in the Cap d’Agde camp to wear face masks and to avoid gatherings of more than 10 people. Exemptions on nightclub openings have also been scrapped.
The outbreak at the nudist resort comes as France reported almost 5,000 new cases of coronavirus on Sunday, a record since the end of lockdown.
