The calm before a new storm on the Covid-19 front? This is what we seem to fear on the side of the North Franche-Comté Hospital. With 100 Covid patients hospitalized, including 13 in intensive care (against more than 200 patients at the height of the first wave), the indicators have never been so low in the Territoire de Belfort since November.
But the Doctor Vincent Gendrin, head of the infectious disease department in Trévenans still talk about “hospital pressure” and fears the arrival of a third wave. It was this wednesday the morning guest of France Bleu Belfort Montbéliard.
The teams breathe a little … but until when?
“We are fortunate to be in a department which is for the moment relatively spared from the Covid, we had a second wave which was very long, very high, and there, since January, we have seen a decrease hospitalizations in intensive care, which is a good thing, because it allows the teams to breathe a bit and to concentrate on the care of other patients who need us for other pathologies “, insists Dr Gendrin.
“Unfortunately, we are a kind of exception, we have more the impression of a reprieve than really of being out of the woods, there is currently an epidemic within the epidemic”, he recalls. “The variants are increasing everywhere in France, and in the departments where the variants become the majority, which is the case in the North or near Nice, as these variants are more contagious, there is a net increase in the arrival of new cases and hospitalizations “.
The rate of variants has apparently gone beyond 20% in the Doubs, it will happen here
“We unfortunately know that these are not compartmentalized epidemics, everywhere in France, the rate of variants is increasing, in our department, we remain for the moment at less than 10% (data from Public Health France will be updated this Thursday editor’s note), but we already know that it is increasing in the Nièvre, and that it is starting to increase in the Doubs, the rate of variants has apparently gone beyond 20% in the Doubs, so we know it will happen to us too “, he explains.
It is however difficult to have forecasts. “We are talking about the end of March for a peak at the national level, but at the local level, we do not really have very precise prospects”, says Dr Gendrin.
Keep the mask on, even outdoors
The relaxation of barrier gestures can it have an impact on this potential third wave? “Of course, it’s cumulative, there are the variants of the viruses which are more contagious, and there is the relaxation of barrier gestures, which is logical in this period when the weather is better and where everyone has had it. le-bol, but the two phenomena together are cumulative “.
Dr Gendrin recommends continuing to apply barrier gestures as strictly as possible, and to keep the mask “even outdoors when you are less than 2 meters from each other”.
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