Paris (AFP)
The day after a first evening under a bell, with an advanced curfew at 6 p.m. across the country, France is preparing to expand the vaccination against Covid-19 on Monday in an attempt to win a tough battle against the virus that has already killed more than 70,000 people.
The entire metropolitan area experienced the evening curfew on Saturday, in force so far in 25 departments, without major inconvenience, except for a clandestine evening in the suburbs of Grenoble which the police put an end to.
A measure intended to "further reduce" social contacts and which will last "at least 15 days", says Prime Minister Jean Castex.
A new confinement decided "without delay" in the event of "severe epidemic deterioration" cannot however be ruled out.
Because the country faces the threat of new variants - British and South African - more contagious, which have already forced several European countries to reconfine themselves.
And this while the intensive care units, which welcome seriously ill patients, are always full, with 2,731 patients occupying the beds on Saturday and 188 new admissions in 24 hours.
At the same time, the disease has killed 196 people, bringing the total death toll to 70,142 since the start of the epidemic, according to the latest figures from Public Health France.
In an attempt to curb the epidemic, the race against time continues to vaccinate the population, after a sluggish and criticized start.
On Monday, the campaign will be extended to people over 75 years old who do not live in nursing homes (5 million people), as well as to nearly 800,000 people with "high risk" pathologies (chronic renal failure, cancer under treatment...).
Sign of the craze for the precious serum, more than a million appointments for the two injections had been taken on Friday, while 833 centers were "open and accessible to reservation", according to the Minister of Health Olivier Véran.
But not all the seniors were able to register, generating some tension.
On Sunday in Paris, the Doctolib platform repeatedly displayed this message: "All vaccination appointments have already been booked. New availabilities will be available in the coming days".
In a country with vaccine-skeptical tendencies, an Ifop poll cited by Le Parisien indicates that 54% of French people now want to be vaccinated.
This is 15 points more than in December, notes the daily, adding that the idea of a "vaccine passport" to access certain places is gaining ground (62% of favorable opinions for taking the plane, 52 % for public transport in particular).
The government is however "very reluctant" to such a passport for travel, said Sunday Clément Beaune, Secretary of State for European Affairs, on France Info.
- "Not enough for everyone" -
Faced with this enthusiasm, Mr. Véran invited "patience" while in total, already 6.4 million people are called to be vaccinated, including priority audiences such as nursing home residents or caregivers.
He said "more than a million vaccinations will be carried out" by the end of January, between 2.4 and 4 million by the end of February.
But, while only 413,000 people had received the precious first injection on Saturday evening, criticism continues to be heard in the opposition and the medical world.
"At the current rate of delivery, it will take more than 4 and a half months to vaccinate only people over 75 years old," notably mocked the mayors of Dijon and Besançon on Saturday.
"We owe the truth to the French: it will take a long time, a very long time," also tweeted PS Senator Patrick Kanner.
"There are not enough vaccines for everyone," said Jacques Battistoni, president of the MG France general practitioner union in the Journal du dimanche.
Predicting "a false start" Monday, he criticizes the government for not launching a mass campaign, but "for organizing queues!"
Visiting Lyon on Saturday, Jean Castex acknowledged that the five million people over 75 could not be vaccinated "in a few days" and called for a vaccination "in peace".
Side doses, after cold sweats the day before linked to the announcement of a drop in production "for three to four weeks", the American group Pfizer, associated with the German laboratory BioNTech, announced on Saturday a "plan" to accelerate production and revert to the original schedule for deliveries to the EU "from the week of January 25".
© 2021 AFP