The longest winter?
The Minister of Health, Olivier Véran, must take stock Thursday evening on the evolution of the Covid-19 epidemic, against the backdrop of a slight increase in contamination and hospitalizations and without the prospect of easing restrictions.
A week after the announcement of the advanced curfew at 6 p.m. throughout the country, Olivier Véran will be on the TF1 set at 8 p.m., but we should not wait for a "big announcement", indicates a source close to the government .
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There will be "no change in national restrictions this week," government spokesman Gabriel Attal said on Wednesday.
"We are giving this (device) a chance, it is possible that this measure will slow down the circulation of the virus even more in our country," he added, while some doctors are already pleading for re-containment.
VIDEO. Covid-19: "There will be no change in national restrictions this week", announces Attal
But “we can ask ourselves whether this confinement, to the extent that vaccines arrive […], could not be offered - and moreover the scientific council has proposed it - to the people most at risk?
“, Suggested on RMC / BFM-TV the infectious disease specialist from Cochin hospital, Odile Launay.
"They are the ones who will be vaccinated very quickly, who are the most at risk of being hospitalized, of having serious forms", she continued, and "that would allow to maintain a certain economic life and in particular for our youngest to consider resuming a life, going back to college ”.
"A nation of 66 million prosecutors"
Emmanuel Macron is also this Thursday at the University of Paris Saclay, where he should discuss the situation of students, deprived of lecture halls for more than two months and more and more subject to precariousness and isolation.
On this occasion and before this exchange, he notably lambasted "a nation of 66 million prosecutors" to respond to criticism of the management of the health crisis.
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On Wednesday, the mark of 25,000 positive cases recorded in one day was exceeded (26,784) for the second time only in January.
According to more consolidated data, but not definitive, the number of people who tested positive remained stable last week, at more than 128,000.
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As a result of the increase in contaminations, hospital admissions have started to rise again, going above 10,000 over seven days since this week.
With more than 25,000 Covid-19 patients hospitalized throughout the country, including 2,842 in intensive care, the burden on the health system remains high, at the same level as at the end of the second wave this fall.
France recorded 316 additional deaths in hospital on Wednesday, a level that has been stable for weeks, bringing the total to 71,652 deaths since the start of the epidemic (hospital and nursing home combined).
The only good news is that the incidence rate - new cases per 100,000 inhabitants over a week - has stabilized nationally for several days, around 190. While it is still too early to see an effect of the covers - lights at 6 pm, the Ministry of Health considers that this solution is "effective" in the fifteen departments where it came into force since January 2.
Two weeks later, the incidence rate is down in ten departments.
The vaccine will not be enough to stop the British variant
But in the eyes of health authorities and many doctors, the context is still made very fragile by the threat of Covid-19 variants, including the more contagious “VOC 202012/01”, which has overwhelmed the hospital system in the United Kingdom, where 1,820 additional deaths were recorded on Wednesday (93,290 deaths in total), a new daily record.
A new point is expected Thursday or Friday on the spread in France of this variant, present in 1 to 2% of cases last week, and on the 501Y.V2 variant detected in South Africa, which scientists fear that it will not be more resistant to the vaccine.
On Wednesday evening, the Directorate General of Health reported an assessment of nearly 693,000 doses of vaccine already injected out of nearly 2 million available, an increase of 200,000 in two days.
But for the scientific council, if vaccines constitute "a major hope for limiting the impact or even largely solving the COVID-19 pandemic", it is "not before the summer - autumn 2021".