While the vaccine campaign is strengthening in France, should we fear a re-containment?
With indicators of the Covid-19 epidemic remaining high, the government still risks being faced with difficult choices.
The executive postponed the reopening of bars, restaurants, cultural places.
In the east and south-east of the country, he also brought forward the curfew to 6 p.m. on Sunday for eight new departments: Cher, Allier, Côte-d'Or, Haut-Rhin and Bas -Rhin, as well as Vaucluse, Alpes-de-Haute-Provence and Bouches-du-Rhône.
From Tuesday, this measure will extend to Var and Drôme, bringing in total to 25 the number of departments concerned.
If a health defense council is scheduled for Wednesday and a new government press conference on Thursday, "at this stage, there is no planned re-containment", however explained the government spokesman, Gabriel Attal, Monday on Europe 1. "But obviously we are monitoring the situation with great attention […] and obviously we will continue to take the necessary measures, particularly in certain cities," he continued.
Asked about the hypothesis of a re-containment, the Minister of Health, Olivier Véran estimated Sunday that "additional measures" will be imposed "if we find that the virus resumes a mad race in the form of a wave".
"Which is not the case at the moment," he said.
The minister does not plan either "at this stage" to close schools, for example by extending the February vacation.
A postponement of the first tests of the bac, in March, was also rejected for the time being, assured Sunday the Minister of Education, Jean-Michel Blanquer, to the Grand Jury RTL-Le Figaro-LCI.
The government is preparing for "all the assumptions", but wants "to avoid until the end a confinement of schools", confided one of the participants in a meeting Monday of the parliamentary liaison committee, where the Prime Minister Jean Castex made update with group leaders in the Assembly and the Senate.
On this occasion, the government announced that a bill extending the state of health emergency would be presented to the Council of Ministers on Wednesday, to be debated on January 18 and 25 in Parliament.
Probable fallout from the end of year celebrations
The circulation of the virus is indeed on the rise in December and the end of year celebrations raise fears of a sharper rebound in January.
Public health France recorded 96,743 positive cases the week of December 28, "in clear increase".
In addition, 28,830 people tested on January 4, the day of the start of the school year, were positive, the highest since mid-November, according to consolidated data from the Geodes platform.
In hospitals, the load remains high, with around 24,526 patients with Covid hospitalized on Sunday, including 2,620 in intensive care, a level that has not dropped significantly for nearly a month.
Last week, the number of daily deaths hovered between 150 and 380, bringing the total death toll to 67,750 since the start of the epidemic.
Another concern: to what extent has the "VOC 202012/01" variant, which caused an epidemic outbreak in the United Kingdom, settled in France?
To try to answer it, and in the face of the appearance of the first potential clusters, a national survey was launched, under the aegis of Public Health France, to make a "first mapping" of this variant, by analyzing all the tests. positive last Thursday and Friday.
For the time being, around forty cases of contamination by the British variant have been detected in France.
This is the case for example in Marseille, where the new mayor PS Benoît Payan estimated that the viral situation was "worrying" after the discovery of a cluster of at least eight cases linked to the English variant of the coronavirus.
The first deputy mayor, Michèle Rubirola, for her part, spoke on Monday of the possibility of a reconfinement of the city, already subject to an advanced curfew.
A measure until now rejected by the municipality and the prefecture.
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A positive test for this British variant has also been confirmed in the Hautes-Alpes, the Provence-Alpes-Côte-d'Azur regional health agency announced on Sunday.
Faced with this new threat, "we are doing everything possible to prevent the spread of this variant," assured Olivier Véran, Sunday.
"I do not want us to experience" the same "catastrophic" situation as in England and Scotland, which had to reconfigure themselves, he nevertheless specified.
The arrival of this mutant virus also worries doctors, who are already planning a third confinement.
"In the middle of the week we will know what the size of the enemy is and there it will be necessary to take the appropriate measures", explained Monday on RMC / BFM-TV, the epidemiologist Arnaud Fontanet, member of the Scientific Council, who guides the choices of the government.
He referred to a "very serious threat" and invited "to ask the question of the closure of borders" with certain countries such as the United Kingdom.
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"It is to be feared that the worsening of the current wave will impose a new confinement in mid-January, due again to serious pressure on the health system", several doctors also warned in a forum in the World, including infectious disease specialist Gilles Pialoux and the PandemIA association.
"Strict and early containment is the best weapon against viral spread, even if it is increasingly resented by the population," they add.
A strengthened vaccine strategy for 2021
But "only vaccination will allow us to avoid losing lives that we could spare," the French Society of Geriatrics and Gerontology insisted on Monday, calling for "lifting the operational locks on vaccination".
After strong criticism of the slow start of the campaign, the country was to exceed 100,000 people this weekend who received the vaccine from the Pfizer / BioNTech alliance, among residents of nursing homes and health professionals, according to Olivier Véran.
In the million doses already received of the Pfizer / BioNtech vaccine, more than 50,000 doses of the Moderna vaccine, which has just been authorized in Europe, were also to be delivered on Monday to be transported to the Grand Est, in Auvergne-Rhône-Alpes. and Paca to be used during the week, the ministry announced.
The vaccination campaign should accelerate this week and the next in retirement homes (Ehpad), where around 1 million elderly people and caregivers at risk are concerned.
The government, which at this stage is expecting 500,000 weekly doses of the Pfizer vaccine, and eventually 500,000 doses per month of Moderna, has changed its strategy and opened up vaccination to all health professionals over 50 years of age or frail, as well. that over 75 years not residing in nursing home, and this from January 18.
With AFP
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