The AstraZeneca vaccination against Covid-19 has been available for city doctors since the end of February.
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SYSPEO / SIPA
From March 15, anti-Covid vaccination will be possible in pharmacies, said the DGS on Sunday evening in an urgent message addressed to health professionals.
To this end, vaccine orders (for delivery next week) are this week open only to pharmacies, and not to liberal doctors who vaccinate in their office.
A decision long awaited by pharmacists, but which arouses the anger of general practitioners, who fear having to cancel the next appointments they had organized.
We must vaccinate, vaccinate, vaccinate.
As much as possible, as quickly as possible, therefore with as many volunteer vaccinators as possible.
In its race against Covid-19, the Directorate General of Health (DGS) sent an urgent message to health professionals on Sunday evening.
The document states that “pharmacists trained in vaccination can prescribe messenger RNA and viral vector vaccines (…) and administer them”.
On the calendar side, the DGS plans "an enlarged opening to all pharmacies from the week of March 15".
To this end, “pharmacists can place their order from Monday March 8 (…), 1 or 2 bottles for their own needs”.
A decision welcomed by them.
"We represent an important reservoir, with nearly 19,000 pharmacies with several vaccinators,"
Gilles Bonnefond, president of the Union of Unions of Community Pharmacists (USPO)
, told
20 Minutes
.
This winter, for the seasonal flu, we vaccinated 1.3 million people in the first week alone.
So vaccination, we know how to do ”.
Important fact: orders are reserved for them this week.
“Pharmacists will receive 340,000 doses between March 18 and 19, while in-pharmacy vaccination is due to open on March 15.
So we will not be able to honor all the requests we receive, adds the pharmacist.
But we don't complain.
We do with what we have and we share the effort between the volunteer vaccinators, doctors, pharmacists, nurses, midwives ”.
The anger of liberal vaccinators
The message from the DGS specifies that therefore "for the week of March 8, the order will only be opened for the specific needs of pharmacies, it will not be possible to take orders for doctors given the number of doses delivered by AstraZeneca ".
A choice that immediately aroused the ire of liberal doctors who volunteered to vaccinate their patients and who fear having to cancel their vaccination appointments for lack of deliveries.
It is an "aberrant decision!"
How many more appointments to cancel while we prioritize this vaccination for the most vulnerable?
Who are we laughing at ?
“, One wonders on the side of the union Les generalistes-CSMF.
"Take your doses for this week well because we won't have any next week!"
The French need a Minister of Health who does not confuse vaccine strategy and communication strategy, ”tackles the union.
"It is to undress Pierre in order to dress Paul!"
The reception of this circular had the effect of a bomb as the doctors saw in it the expression of a contempt coupled with a guilty lightness ”, condemns the French Union for a free medicine (UFML), which asks to the minister "to react and stop this decision seen as an insult".
A feeling shared by Dr Jean-Paul Hamon, general practitioner and honorary president of the Fédération des médecins de France (FMF).
This decision "discourages, demobilizes and angers, because it risks disrupting vaccination in the city," he told
20 Minutes
.
Today, all the doctors are asking for the resignation of Jérôme Salomon [the Director General of Health].
The day after a weekend when liberal doctors and nurses mobilized in vaccination centers for this government communication operation, receiving an email from the DGS on Sunday evening at 10 p.m. telling us that it was not not sure whether the doctors are getting their vaccine doses for the next week is unacceptable!
It is not just that to make appointments to cancel them on the grounds that the DGS is doing a pirouette.
If the vaccines do not arrive next week, I stop vaccinating at my office!
Mr. Solomon will go and vaccinate on his own ”.
Will GPs have to cancel future appointments?
In total, "doctors have ordered 1.6 million doses and these orders will be fully honored, reassures the DGS, questioned by
20 Minutes
.
There were approximately 862,000 doses delivered between February 22 and March 8.
And a delivery of 765,000 doses is scheduled between March 11 and 15.
No appointment made under these orders has to be canceled, ”insists the Directorate, which depends on the Ministry of Health.
If this week's order is "exceptionally open to pharmacists only, it is because of the low number of doses delivered by the laboratory for the week of March 15: 280,000 in all", replies the DGS.
This is to "allow to expand the vaccine coverage of eligible people, by going to seek patients whose doctors have not ordered vaccine", she justifies, which specifies that "pharmacists will have the possibility to inject 347,000 doses of vaccines for deliveries on March 11 and 15 ”.
As for pharmacists, we are not moved by the fears of liberal doctors, deemed unfounded.
“Of the 862,000 doses received, they only injected 40% as of Friday.
This means that they still have 500,000 doses in the fridges and that they will receive 760,000, or about three weeks of stock ", tempers Gilles Bonnefond, for whom" this controversy is completely inappropriate.
There is a small air gap in the supply of AstraZeneca vaccines but then the deliveries will increase even more, and there we will need all hands!
The mistake was to delay vaccination by pharmacists ”.
Dr. Hamon, "waits to see if the doses will be delivered next week".
For its part, the DGS ensures that "subject to compliance with the volume and the supply schedule by the laboratory, orders will again be open to all health professionals likely to vaccinate in town on Monday March 15".
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