Will the new Covid screening centers in Ile-de-France be enough?

The Minister of Health Olivier Véran visiting a screening center in Mantes-la-Jolie, where time slots are reserved for screening priority audiences.

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• About twenty Covid-19 screening centers are deployed from this Monday in Ile-de-France.

  The objective is to strengthen screening capacity, and above all to rapidly test those deemed to have priority.

• These are those presenting symptoms of the coronavirus, contact cases and nursing staff.

• But "the question arises of knowing how to ensure a large volume of urgent tests for which it is necessary to be able to provide rapid results", estimates Dr. François Blanchecotte, of the Syndicat des biologistes.

What if rather than always testing more, we tested better?

This seems to be the credo of the government today, which is revising its strategy by favoring targeted tests over massive screening.

Waiting to obtain an appointment, waiting to obtain its results, individual confinement of the people tested and their contact case: to want - and rightly so - to detect the greatest number of people infected with Covid-19, the system quickly reached its limits and medical biology laboratories found themselves underwater.

Hospitals and biologists in Ile-de-France may well have passed "in a few weeks from 45,000 to 200,000 weekly tests", "difficulties of access (...) remain", noted the regional health agency (ARS) of Ile-de -France.

It is with this in mind that the Minister of Health, Olivier Véran, announced a prioritization a few days ago.

As of Monday, the ARS is deploying twenty permanent Covid-19 screening and diagnostic centers (CDDC), which will be able to carry out up to 10,000 samples per day, in order to relieve congestion in laboratories overwhelmed by demand.

They will remain open “until the end of the winter period”.

Will this be enough?

Unclog laboratories

While the queues are always full in front of the “591 sampling points” in the Paris region, the objective, with this twenty screening barnums, is to meet the galloping demand for tests.

"The Covid emergency telephone platforms, supposed to refer people wishing to be tested, are overwhelmed and have difficulty finding available laboratories," explains

Dr François Blanchecotte, president of the Syndicate of biologists

, to 

.

And there are great disparities between laboratories, especially in Paris and Ile-de-France, with differences ranging from 1 to 5 in technical capacities and means.

Some labs are totally overwhelmed.

So, twenty additional centers in a region where screening capacities are under strain as demand is high, that's obviously a good thing ”.

“We still have to manage to follow behind,” adds the biologist.

Today, there is an increase in demand for screening of 20% per week, every week.

Obviously, there are difficulties to follow, and today the question arises of knowing how to ensure a large volume of urgent tests for which it is necessary to have the technical capacity to provide rapid results ”.

Ensure targeted and rapid screening for priority people

Thus, in Ile-de-France, the twenty new barnums will each be able to perform "at least 500 tests per day", or a total of 10,000 additional tests per day, with "a commitment to return the results within 24 hours" , promises the ARS.

More importantly, they are intended to refocus the government's screening strategy by ensuring more targeted and faster tests for priority people.

Open all day, these new CDDC will thus be "reserved from 8 am to 2 pm for priority audiences, without an appointment," indicates the ARS.

This concerns "people with a medical prescription [showing symptoms], people who have had a risk of contact with a confirmed case, and who have been contacted by the CPAM or the ARS in the context of contact tracing", thus that "health professionals and similar professionals working at home," says the agency.

This is how Laure underwent an RT-PCR test on Monday after one of her colleagues declared symptoms of the disease.

"I will have the results very quickly, at least I will be fixed quickly, which is much more practical for organizing the work week and managing family life and the care of my child," says the young woman to 

I don't want to take the risk of infecting others ”.

"If we are in contact, symptomatic or caregiver, getting tested must be fast," Olivier Véran recalled on Twitter on Monday, traveling to Mantes-la-Jolie (Yvelines), in a barnum set up for the test of priority people.

We are deploying # COVID19 test centers for priority people everywhere in 🇫🇷, including 20 in Île-de-France.

Meeting in Mantes-la-Jolie with the professionals involved.

If we are in contact, symptomatic or caregiver, getting tested must be quick.

pic.twitter.com/lj4oZnvcQK

- Olivier Véran (@olivierveran) September 21, 2020

"The idea of ​​contracting a fast channel is good," analyzes Dr. Blanchecotte.

We have been asking for this prioritization of tests for a long time, with a line reserved for the most urgent cases.

The problem is that according to the established criteria, we arrive at almost one in two people who would be a priority, he believes.

With potentially more than 500,000 urgent weekly tests to be processed in twenty-four hours ... However, there are more and more positive samples in collective settings, particularly in nursing homes, where screening must be carried out as quickly as possible ".

" Take his responsibilities "

For Dr. Blanchecotte, it is also important that everyone show responsibility.

"The clusters that we identified this weekend are for the vast majority of family clusters, families who saw each other in a private setting, without protecting themselves," he regrets.

In addition, “some patients who test positive for the coronavirus come back to be tested several times, until their test is negative, which contributes to the overcrowding of laboratories and the lengthening of waiting times.

The instructions are however simple: if you test positive, observe a quarantine of seven days, then resume the course of your life by respecting the barrier gestures, that's all!

"

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