Moselle: Véran announces more tests and vaccines in the face of an outbreak of Covid - France 24

Metz (AFP)

The Minister of Health Olivier Véran announced Friday in Metz a strengthening of the testing and vaccination policy in Moselle, a department which has a higher incidence than in the rest of the territory, in particular with an increase in the South African variant.

"Any positive case of coronavirus will now be considered in this department as suspect of a variant until proved to the contrary, that is to say, it will benefit from immediate contact tracing, from accompanied sheltering immediate isolation increased to ten days against seven, "said Mr. Véran during a trip to Moselle.

A PCR test will be carried out before the lifting of isolation for positive cases and a PCR test will be carried out from the first day on all possible contact cases, he added after a meeting with elected officials. mosellans.

"The Moselle will benefit for this from the help of the team of the ministry and of the other" regional health agencies (ARS), underlined the minister, while the first analyzes on the positive cases "tend to prove the hypothesis that 'they are indeed variants of South African origin ".

The current estimate relates to more than 100 cases per day in Moselle, detailed Mr. Véran.

In Moselle, "75% of the elderly" in nursing homes have so far received at least one dose of vaccine, indicated the minister who, "at the request of local elected officials", still wants to "strengthen" the vaccination policy in the Department.

Thus, "2,000 doses of Moderna vaccines could be made available to the population, in particular people aged 75 and over in the next few days".

For the other measures requested by elected officials, it will be necessary to wait for the continuation of the consultations, warned Mr. Véran.

"Several proposals have been made" without consensus, such as that of immediate local containment or an early closure of schools, he said.

"I will (…) continue the consultation, in particular discussing the issue of schools" with the Minister of National Education, Jean-Michel Blanquer, he added.

Asked after the meeting, the LR mayor of Metz François Grosdidier, who pleads for "short-term confinement" and "the closure of schools", said his disappointment at the lack of an immediate decision, especially on schools.

"There is a real explosion (incidence) among young people aged 10 to 20. I do hope that they will decide to move forward a week. We would have liked to have had this decision now to prepare. 'moment we don't know ".

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