“The epidemic is still there. The arrival of summer, the decline in the circulation of the virus and the lifting of health restrictions could almost make him forget. On the sidelines of a European Union summit in Brussels, Emmanuel Macron called for more vigilance, noting that this variant “is spreading much faster than the previous ones”. According to the European Center for Disease Prevention and Control (ECDC), the Delta variant will be predominant in Europe by the end of the summer and could account for 90% of new cases of Covid-19.
This Thursday, the Prime Minister and the Minister of Health were traveling to Mont-de-Marsan in the Landes, a department which is experiencing a resumption of the epidemic with the presence of the Delta variant (ex-Indian variant). The variant represents 70% of new contaminations according to the ARS which specifies that this percentage relates to only 126 tests.
The visit of Jean Castex and the Minister of Health also follows the discovery of a cluster in a nursing home in Pontonx-sur-l’Adour. 23 residents and 6 staff members tested positive. Of the 23 infected residents, 21 were fully vaccinated, with two doses. Three of them were hospitalized, without being transferred to intensive care.
In the South-West department, “the situation is not catastrophic, the epidemic is under control, but the situation in the Landes should not prefigure the development of this variant,” assured Jean Castex. A concern is linked to this Delta variant, which is undoubtedly progressing a little inexorably everywhere ”. The minister announced reinforced measures in the department with the delivery of 20,000 additional doses and a test campaign.
Heard in the Senate yesterday, the Minister of Health addressed the case of the nursing home in Pontonx-sur-l’Adour, exasperating that some of the staff had not been vaccinated. Olivier Véran does not rule out proposing compulsory vaccination for nursing staff and nursing home staff in September: “I will not leave nursing homes again, infected by the virus”.
Trained as a doctor, the socialist senator Bernard Jomier awaits the next models to decide on the compulsory vaccination of caregivers but has a feeling that “it will be a subject of debate”. According to him, “there could be a 4th wave but not with a large number of serious forms, hospitalizations, deaths. Is this an acceptable pattern for all that? I do not think that it is desirable to let the virus circulate, answers the socialist senator. He believes that restrictive measures can not be the first response and that we must appeal to the responsibility of caregivers.
For the senator of the Landes, Monique Lubin (PS), on the other hand, it is unthinkable “to know that among the staff of nursing homes, some are not vaccinated”, she recalls the suffering experienced by families and residents with the judgment visits. The senator therefore agrees with the minister’s position but is surprised at this sequence of “communication”.
“It is not a question of minimizing but it comes from a dramatization of the subject which does not have to be”, estimates it while recalling that the residents were in majority, asymptomatic. What also annoys him is having been fixed on the situation and informed of the ministerial visit by means of the press. “As a parliamentarian, I received no warning message. We were warned yesterday of the minister’s visit, but nothing more, ”says Monique Lubin.
The senator is also worried about the media coverage around the contamination of nursing home residents who have been vaccinated. The lack of explanations around this situation could, according to her, promote the discourse of anti-vaccines. René-Paul Savary (LR), doctor by training and former vice-president of the commission of inquiry on the management of the pandemic, provides a simple explanation: “Vaccination reduces the risk of developing serious forms and reduces the viral load , but the elderly have less immunity than those in their prime ”.
“There is a need to maintain vigilance and perhaps the message is not clear enough, we no longer hear about the Tous anti Covid application, for example,” also notes the senator from Marne. Yesterday, in the Council of Ministers, the government spokesman, Gabriel Attal, indicated that the Delta variant represented between 9 and 10% of the contaminations on the national territory. Twice more than last week when it represented only 4.6% of positive tests. In the race between the variants, it’s a safe bet that it is the Delta variant that will gain the upper hand, “it is the very principle of viruses”, explains René-Paul Savary, who insists: “The only way to ‘escaping a 4th wave is vaccination’.
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