In a Europe in the midst of the storm, how is France doing?
With 1.6 million cases, the highest number of contaminations since the start of the Covid-19 pandemic on the Old Continent, and an average of 400 daily deaths since Monday, the indicators are turning scarlet.
China has just announced that it is blocking the arrival of foreign travelers from France, as it had already done with the United Kingdom, Belgium or India.
Is our country becoming the epicenter of the pandemic?
Globally, no, says Antoine Flahault, director of the Institute for Global Health at the University of Geneva.
"It is in fact the whole of the western northern hemisphere" that must be taken into account.
"Today, we are seeing very intense activity in Eastern and Western Europe, the United States and North Africa," explains the epidemiologist.
If we take a step back, we see that all of Western Europe is in a situation of an autumn epidemic with a curve whose pace is exponential.
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How is France situated in this explosive Europe?
To define the epicenter of the epidemic, that is, the area most severely affected by a phenomenon, several indicators must be considered.
More tests in France
If France is the European country with the largest number of cases, as the Director General of Health Jérôme Salomon recalled Thursday, this data should be taken with a grain of salt.
The number of new contaminations announced each evening by Public Health France has in fact been underestimated for several days, due to technical problems, and "all countries do not have the same screening policy", warns Mircea T. Sofonea, epidemiologist and lecturer at the University of Montpellier.
Moreover, France appears to be one of the countries which test the most, ahead of the United Kingdom and the United States.
“Maybe France, which tests a lot, has more positive cases than its neighbors,” says Antoine Flahault.
And to underline: “All the countries of Europe see their cases increasing.
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The hospital indicator is also difficult to interpret.
“You do not have the same definition of resuscitation or critical care beds from one country to another,” explains Mircea T. Sofonea, who also recalls that “the logistics” are not identical between the different States.
"Ultimately, the most consensual, and it is very sad, is to compare mortality", even if, here again, "biases exist".
"Provisional epicenter"
On this point, France is pale.
The number of new daily deaths recorded over the last seven days is very high.
The country is above its European neighbors, "shoulder to shoulder with Argentina", observes the epidemiologist.
When we relate the number of deaths to the population, France comes on the other hand behind Belgium or the Czech Republic.
"But overall, it is still in the top 3 indicators", notes the specialist in the modeling of infectious diseases.
For these reasons, "France can be considered as a temporary epicenter of the epidemic," he said.
“She waited too long to take action.
"The damage caused by the explosion of the epidemic is" not only human but also socio-economic, "said Mircea T. Sofonea, citing the index of health restrictions developed by researchers at the University of Oxford (United Kingdom -United).
France, which has put in place a second containment after curfew measures, has the strongest index in Europe (78.7) behind Ireland (81.48), the first country of the Old Continent to to have been placed under cover in the fall.
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“All estimates showed that the situation was going to be explosive in November, but the executive waited until the last moment to act, unlike our neighbors.
It is paid for with a relatively long confinement.
However, and we see it in some Asian countries, we have everything to gain from confining very early, ”laments the epidemiologist.
A declining reproduction rate
For Antoine Flahault, the reproduction rate, called “R” - the number of people that an infected individual will infect on average - is the main indicator to be observed today.
If it drops below 1, it means the country has regained control of the epidemic and hospitals can take a breather.
However, France, whose R fell to 1.1 Thursday evening, is this time one of the good European students, behind Ireland (0.74), the United Kingdom (1.02) and the Netherlands (1.02).
Respect for barrier gestures "accompanied by stricter government measures have led to a drop in mobility" and therefore R, explains the epidemiologist.
“We can hope for a possible control of the phenomenon by next week.
The drop in hospitalizations will then follow, a week to fifteen days later.
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Why speak of an epicenter when the country seems to be on the right track to regain control? asks Antoine Flahault. "France is not the place that explodes the most, if the concept of explosion is the R. It is rather a hot embers, which would be at the end of a process of outbreak", hopes he.