To cope with the intensification of the epidemic caused by the coronavirus, masks with a high level of protection, called FFP2, will be sent to doctors who do not practice in the hospital, indicated the Minister of Health, Olivier Véran, this Friday on Europe 1.
"I informed yesterday (Thursday) evening all the union leaders of liberal physicians as well as the president of the National Council of the Order of Physicians that they would have FFP2 masks given to them," said Olivier Véran.
"It is important to protect those who protect us"
"It is immediate, the logistics start first in the direction of the sites where the circulation of the virus is most active and (where) we start to call on city medicine as the first curtain", he added . This will be done "very gradually" on "the national territory", he protected. "It is only a matter of logistics, it is important to protect those who protect us," he said. There are two types of masks. The first, surgical masks, are those that a patient must wear to avoid contaminating other people.
The others, called FFP2 (in the shape of a duckbill), are more sophisticated and equip hospitals. They have a filtering system and are waterproof when placed on the face, to offer a higher level of protection. In recent weeks, unions of liberal doctors have demanded that FFP2 masks be urgently provided to these caregivers, arguing that surgical masks are not enough to protect doctors.
Fifteen million masks already distributed
On March 3, Olivier Véran announced that 15 million surgical masks had been taken from the state stock for them, as well as for Ehpad, and that fifteen to twenty million others should follow, also from some 145 million in stock. Caregivers can pick them up at pharmacies.
"I have destocked twice 15 million masks, by truck in all pharmacies of France (...), we are the only country to have made a requisition," said the minister Friday. "We are massively sending masks wherever we can and there is a management of these masks which must be done over time," he concluded.
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