This is one of the subjects on which the government and the Scientific Council regularly insist. Patient monitoring “brigades” will be necessary at the time of deconfinement, to track people who have been in contact with them. The aim is to avoid a second wave of the epidemic.
In its opinion of April 20, the Scientific Council recommends the establishment of "telephone platforms supplemented by mobile teams for the management of diagnosed cases and their contacts".
What is the interest of these "brigades"?
Such teams make it possible to break the chains of transmission by limiting the contacts of people potentially infected.
“If we release the confinement, we mechanically increase the number of contacts between individuals. To compensate, there is the wearing of the mask, but we do not know how effective it will be. Another way is to reduce the time during which infected people will risk infecting other individuals, ”says epidemiologist Pascal Crépey, researcher at the graduate school of public health.
A possible mobile tracking application, desired by the government, would not detract from its usefulness for human tracking. “We talk about it a lot and it crystallizes a lot of anxiety, it's something that could work, but on condition that you have the support of a majority of people. And this possible tool will never replace field investigation, ”pleads Pascal Crépey.
In its opinion of April 20, the Scientific Council also judges that "the two approaches (digital tool, platforms and mobile teams) are complementary and potentially affect different audiences".
How it works ?
Specialists are mobilized to "investigate" the entourage of infected and tested positive patients. The idea is to interview each of them, mainly by phone, to find out who they may have been in contact with during the infectious phase. These people will in turn be contacted to ask them, at a minimum, to scrupulously respect the health regulations. And, in some cases, to go get tested.
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These "brigades" are nothing new. They were already operational at the time of stage 2 of the epidemic, before the containment which came into force on March 17. In Haute-Savoie and Oise, in particular, epidemiologists and doctors, coordinated by Public Health France and by regional health authorities, had been mobilized.
With containment, this was no longer necessary. And, from May 11, "in practice, we must simply imagine that it will happen as in stage 2, but in a much larger dimension", says Pascal Crépey, who himself participated in these "brigades" during the previous phase. "Many people simply needed answers, some were even waiting to be called," he says.
Who will compose them?
This is the big question. "Given the size of our country, we must count on about 30,000 people: general practitioners, caregivers, members of the voluntary sector, the health services of town halls ... Without that, it will not work," said the president of Scientific Council, Jean-François Delfraissy, in Le Monde on April 26.
For the moment, the authorities have not indicated how the "recruitment" will operate. Sunday, April 19, the Minister of Health, Olivier Véran, simply indicated that he counted on "many people, not necessarily caregivers, people who are trained". "Our teams spent the weekend working there," says one at ARS Ile-de-France.
By way of comparison, Belgium (which has less than 12 million inhabitants) plans to recruit 2,000 investigators. 20,000 operate in South Korea which has also automated the digital tracking of patients.
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