Paris (AFP)

Overwhelmed and unable to coordinate the rescue: in a report on vitriol, the federation of firefighters has strangled the management of the coronavirus epidemic by the Ministry of Health and its agencies, which denounce unfounded accusations.

For the National Federation of Firefighters of France (FNSPF), which oversees the 247,000 firefighters in the country, the Covid-19 epidemic should have been the opportunity to mobilize all the administrations and rescue services as well as possible.

But in an internal report intended for the Ministry of the Interior, and revealed Sunday by the Parisian, it draws a scathing observation of the management of the crisis by the government, accused of having entrusted the piloting to the only Ministry of Health.

This report fuels longstanding tensions between firefighters, who depend on the interior, and health services on how to manage emergency calls, rescue and transportation of the sick.

This document "is not finalized and should not leak into the press," said AFP Hugues Deregnaucourt, vice-president of the FNSPF, while assuming these scathing criticisms vis-à-vis the Ministry of Health and its regional health agencies (ARS).

In this crisis, the health administration was entrusted with "the role of crisis commander, when nothing in its organization and culture predisposed it to effectively perform this role", denounces the FNSPF.

The ARS "seemed to be monopolized by the management of the number of places in hospital resuscitation and by the statistical feedback", affirms the report.

Until mid-March, he added, the Interior Ministry and the prefects were excluded from the decision-making process. Then there was "a two-headed organization between the ministries of health and the interior". But to manage a crisis, you need "a single command", according to the FNSPF.

- "Esbroufe" -

All this has greatly complicated the work and organization of the emergency services on the ground.

"We lacked pragmatism, realism, proximity and confidence in those who face the problems of people on a daily basis", abounded in the afternoon the president of the FNSPF, Grégory Allione.

"The mayors and the departments have never been used by the ARS," he told AFP during a visit to Sallanches (Haute-Savoie).

This absence of dialogue has in particular favored "the forgetfulness of the Ehpad, leaving only the local authorities faced with the deaths in number of our elders", underlines the report.

"We were reporting" the situation in the nursing homes and the firefighters offered to evacuate the sick, "but nothing was happening," regretted Mr. Allione. The firefighters felt particularly "underused", emphasizes their federation.

"In some departments," we really took care not to use the firefighters, "added Mr. Deregnaucourt.

The FNSPF also denounces the saturation of the emergency number 15, regulated by the Samu, with, according to it, waiting times sometimes bordering on forty minutes.

And take the opportunity to call again for the establishment of two numbers, 112 for emergencies and 116-117 for other treatments, to relieve Samu standards (15) like his (17) flooded with calls not always urgent.

The report also pinpoints the hundreds of evacuations of patients by TGV or helicopter aimed at relieving congestion in hospitals, a "real blunder" according to the federation, "because often there was room in the clinic opposite".

Questioned by AFP, the Ministry of Health regretted the publication "in the midst of a crisis" of a "clearly unsupported report" which "does not reflect the actions" of the professionals involved.

He challenged any lack of communication between ARS and prefectures and justified the evacuations by train from Ile-de-France where, "at the end of March, there was only one resuscitation bed available".

President of Samu-Urgences de France, François Braun, for his part, denounced to AFP a "pamphlet" compiling "false information" which testifies to "the great frustration" of the federation.

"People have managed to reach the Samu. We have not lost any serious calls, and above all we have helped to unclog the emergencies," said Mr. Braun, but did not exclude filing a defamation complaint.

Since the start of the coronavirus epidemic which left nearly 30,000 people dead in France, the executive has been the target of numerous complaints for "endangering the lives of others" or "manslaughter".

emd-rfo-esp-str / cb

© 2020 AFP