Emmanuel Macron during his televised address announcing a second confinement on Wednesday.
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Ludovic MARIN / AFP
Several viral publications on social networks accuse the President of the Republic of having knowingly exaggerated the Covid-19 figures by announcing on October 28 that “whatever we do”, 9,000 people would be hospitalized in intensive care in mid-November.
As of November 16, 4,854 Covid patients were in intensive care, according to Jérôme Salomon.
The head of state relied on projections from the Institut Pasteur, which did not take into account the effects of a new confinement, nor those of the restrictive measures adopted earlier, such as the curfew. .
Did Emmanuel Macron knowingly lie about the Covid-19 figures to scare the French?
In any case, this is what Philippe Torre, vice-president of Debout la France, Nicolas Dupont-Aignan's party, says on Twitter.
In a Facebook post shared hundreds of times, the politician highlights a quote from President Emmanuel Macron, delivered on October 28, when he announced a second confinement to deal with the coronavirus pandemic: "Whatever we did, nearly 9,000 people will be in intensive care in mid-November.
"
On this Facebook post, the vice-president of Debout la France, Philippe Torre, accuses Emmanuel Macron of knowingly lying about the Covid figures to scare the French.
“According to Public Health France, as of November 15, there are […] 4,880 people in intensive care.
He plays on fears!
", Denounces Philippe Torre, who adds in comment:" They are so bad that they are obliged to lie, lie, and still lie.
"
If these words are those of Emmanuel Macron, where does the error come from?
From the Head of State, or on the contrary from the forecasts on which he is based?
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On October 28, Emmanuel Macron announced that France must reconfigure itself for a minimum of one month, and warned the French: “At this stage, we know that whatever we do, nearly 9,000 patients will be in intensive care in mid-November, or almost all of the French capacities.
"
Remarks qualified by Olivier Véran,
a few days later, during his weekly report on the evolution of the Covid-19 epidemic.
"If we do not sufficiently respect the confinement, then we will experience a strong risk of saturation at the national level from mid-November with more than 7,000 patients with Covid in intensive care", affirmed the Minister of Health.
But then what figures is the president using to make such a catastrophic forecast?
On the projections of the Institut Pasteur.
Contacted by
20 Minutes,
the main designer of these projections within the Institute, researcher Simon Cauchemez, explains the confusion: “At the end of October, we anticipated 9,000 intensive care beds occupied in mid-November, with a wide range of uncertainty between 5,000 and 9,000, ”he explains.
"But this projection did not take into account the positive effects of a future confinement, nor those of the measures taken a few days earlier, such as the curfew", adds the researcher.
“At the beginning of November, we revised these projections downwards, to around 5,000 beds for the scenario with confinement (with an uncertainty range between 4,500 and 7,000 beds) after having detected a decrease in the number of reproductions over the period which preceded the implementation of confinement, ”explains Simon Cauchemez.
This projection turned out to be correct, since on November 15, as indicated by Philippe Torre, 4,880 people were in intensive care, according to Public Health France.
"Create an electroshock"
To find out what had led the President of the Republic to give the figure of 9,000 patients hospitalized in intensive care,
20 Minutes
contacted the Elysee.
“On the evening of the speech, the president did not know the effects of the restrictive measures that have already been taken to limit the spread of Covid-19.
He does know, however, that the R (virus reproduction rate, ie the number of people infected on average by an infected person) is 1.3 and that, if we do not go down quickly, the projections will explode ”, indicates the entourage of the Head of State.
"President Emmanuel Macron therefore mentions the high range of the Institut Pasteur projections because, that evening, faced with the emergency, he needs to create an electric shock," explains the Elysee.
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