For the past month, the number of patients over 75 years of age hospitalized has been declining.

Daniel Levy-Bruhl, head of the respiratory infections unit of the Public Health France agency, sees "the benefit of vaccination".

One in four people over 75 has already received at least one dose of the vaccine. 

With 3,680 patients currently in intensive care and a total of 24,765 people hospitalized in France, hospital pressure caused by the coronavirus epidemic remains high.

But things are gradually improving for part of the population: the over 75s, in whom the number of hospitalizations has been falling continuously for a month.  

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Thus, last week, there were just over 4,000 new hospitalizations in this segment of the population.

A figure which remains high, but which attests to a certain decrease.

A month ago, there were 5,500, 1,500 more to be hospitalized each week.

And the observation is the same in the entries in intensive care: 412 last week, 509 during the week of the end of January. 

"Not enough to reverse the general trend"

Many observers see it as the first effects of vaccination, with one in four people over the age of 75 having already received at least one dose of the vaccine.

"Everything converges to attribute to the observed decrease in the various indicators in subjects over 75 years of age, the benefit of vaccination", explains to Europe 1 Daniel Levy-Bruhl, head of the respiratory infections unit of the Public Health agency France.

However, he nuances immediately, "the fact of reducing the risk of hospitalization in the 75 years and more is not enough to reverse the general tendency to increase of the current epidemiology". 

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The average age in intensive care is falling

Consequence of this "little" good news for those over 75: the average age of hospitalized and intensive care patients is falling.

In recent days, a quarter of patients hospitalized in Paris for Covid are under 40 years old.