Paris (AFP)
Masks continue to arrive in France on Monday from China to cope with the shortage and the acceleration of the epidemic, which is entering a particularly difficult phase.
After a first shipment of 5.5 million medical masks by an Air France plane which landed Sunday at Paris-Roissy airport, a new convoy is expected with medical equipment including masks on Monday in Vatry, in the Marne , in the Grand Est region, particularly affected by the epidemic.
As part of this airlift, France awaits the delivery of a billion masks spread over 14 weeks at the rate of 2 deliveries per week, said the Minister of Health who announced on Saturday that he had ordered "more than a billion of masks ".
The country needs 40 million masks per week and manufactures only 8 million, according to the Minister of Health Olivier Véran.
The caregivers - on the front line - but also the police or, in general, many employees forced to continue working outside, continue to denounce the lack of masks.
"We see the use of equipment which is also exploding. The coats, the masks ... all the patients are currently positive so we must equip ourselves. We have not yet had any equipment rupture, but we fear it" , testified to AFP a nurse in Bordeaux who requested anonymity.
- Peak at the end of the week -
The same caregiver adds that he is starting to feel things speed up in the West, relatively spared so far. In his Covid unit, which has a capacity of 16 beds, 12 were occupied Sunday against 5 Wednesday.
The same goes for Stéphane Gaudry, professor of intensive medicine at the Avicienne hospital in Bobigny.
"The peak is scheduled for the end of the week instead," he said on France Inter on Monday, deploring the non-compliance with confinement in Seine-Saint-Denis, one of the poorest departments in France. , "one of the reasons why (he) is very affected".
The coronavirus has caused 292 new deaths recorded in hospital in 24 hours in France, bringing the death toll to 2,606 deaths since the start of the epidemic in December, according to the latest data published on Sunday evening.
And Prime Minister Edouard Philippe, who had extended the confinement at least until April 15, warned Saturday that the next 15 days would be more difficult than the past two weeks.
The Director General of Health, Jérôme Salomon, said Sunday of a "10% increase in incoming patients" over one day, "reflecting contamination that occurred before containment measures".
A total of 4,632 severe cases require very heavy intensive care, added Mr. Salomon. In 24 hours, 359 new patients were placed in intensive care.
"It is this daily number of resuscitation entries that is the most important element to monitor in order to predict our capacity to manage the most serious patients. It reflects the dynamics of the epidemic," said Mr. Solomon.
The most important evacuations since the beginning of the epidemic took place Sunday to unclog hospitals in the Grand Est, one of the regions most affected by the pandemic, but not the only one.
French army helicopters and a German military plane had transported Covid-19 patients from this region to south-west Germany, and medical TGVs had evacuated patients to New Aquitaine.
Jérôme Salomon clarified that 250 patients benefited from transfers to unclog saturated hospitals.
- Alert on the dangers of hydroxychloroquine -
While there is no proven treatment for Covid-19, the health authorities of New Aquitaine warned Sunday against taking by self-medication of hydroxychloroquine, promoted by some scientists as a possible remedy against the virus and whose use is authorized in hospitals only for severe cases.
"Cases of cardiac toxicity have been reported (...) following self-medication (...) of hydroxychloroquine in the face of symptoms suggestive of Covid-19, sometimes requiring hospitalization in intensive care," says the Regional health agency in a press release which "warns of the dangers" of this drug.
On the economic front, the Minister of Economy Bruno Le Maire on Monday called on companies using partial unemployment measures in the face of the Covid-19 epidemic not to pay dividends, after banning them from doing so. groups benefiting from a deferral of charges.
He also said he would not make any further growth forecasts before the end of containment, saying that the recession caused by the coronavirus would be "much deeper" than -1%.
© 2020 AFP