REPORTAGE
They are on the front line of defense against the spread of the disease. While the coronavirus epidemic continues to progress in France, are general practitioners sufficiently equipped to deal with this epidemic which has already reached 285 French people? Even if Emmanuel Macron announced Tuesday the requisition of the stocks and the production of the masks, and that they can go to look for them in pharmacies, the generalists estimate to be under-equipped.
A lack of equipment ...
Contrary to the recommendations of the Ministry of Health, many French people rush to their GP when they have a cough or fever instead of calling 15. Suddenly, in this Parisian medical office which visited Europe 1, one of the secretary's new missions is ... to sort out patients, and to distribute masks to suspect patients. She even wrote instructions on a sheet asking feverish patients not to enter the waiting room.
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So to cope, Doctor Serge Gilberg was forced to stockpile masks. He started to store it two weeks ago, and even if he was able to get it this week from his pharmacist, he still believes that he is missing "protective glasses, and then possibly gloves and gowns" . Generalists have also seized the administrative court of Paris to demand to be able to supply themselves with FFP2 masks, those which they can effectively protect them.
... and information
Another point of tension in the city medicine, the lack of information: the generalists consider that the instructions are not clear enough on the management of the patients, in particular on the moment when they must pass the baton to the hospitals, or even on the type of patient to be monitored.