If a new confinement is not on the agenda in metropolitan France, the inhabitants of Mayotte will be forced there again from this Friday evening.
The government has decided to reconfigure the island, which is facing a sharp deterioration in the health situation, for at least three weeks.
All indicators of the Covid-19 epidemic are indeed on the rise in Mayotte.
The incidence rate, corresponding to the number of new cases per 100,000 inhabitants over the past week, reached 441 on February 1, according to the most recent data from Public Health France.
That number has quadrupled in three weeks.
For the whole of France, the incidence rate is "only" at 213, stable for ten days and up 14% in three weeks.
In some municipalities in Mayotte, this indicator even exceeds 800. Three of them were already confined since February 1.
The increase in the incidence rate is particularly impressive on the island among the 60-69 year olds, in whom it exceeds the value 1800. But young people are also affected since no age group (except 0-9 years) does not escape an increase.
Schools will also remain closed.
The positivity rate has also risen a lot in recent weeks, to now approach 18%.
78 confirmed cases of the South African variant
This sharp increase in contamination could be explained in particular by the spread of variants, in particular the one identified in neighboring South Africa.
On Thursday, 78 infected people were carriers and another had been infected with the so-called British variant.
"The sequencing times amounting to several days, the number of carriers of these variants is actually much higher", points out the prefecture of Mayotte.
"Given the difficulties of contact tracing and isolation of cases in Mayotte, community circulation of the variant [known as South African] is probable", adds Public Health France in its regional epidemiological bulletin published Thursday evening.
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This very strong increase in new cases is already reflected in the hospital.
More than 80 patients diagnosed with Covid-19 are hospitalized, compared to less than 10 two weeks earlier.
Twelve of these patients were treated in intensive care Thursday, and ten others enter the hospital every day on average over the past week.
"The number of patients affected by the Covid admitted to emergencies, medicine and intensive care is progressing at an unprecedented speed", warns the prefecture.
"Given the much higher transmissibility of the South African variant, it is likely that it more easily reaches fragile people, generating more and more serious forms of the disease", observes for its part Public Health France, while specifying that "no scientific evidence indicates that it would be at the origin of more severe forms or an increased risk of death in infected persons".
The head of the emergency department of the Mayotte Hospital Center, Christophe Caralp, mentions an “epidemic wall” in Mayotte the 1st.
“We added more beds.
We started to deprogram interventions.
We will have to evacuate patients to Reunion, ”he warns.
Mayotte, the latest for vaccination
On the spot, the deputy Mansour Kamardine (The Republicans) is particularly worried by the consequences of this health crisis on the youth, until then relatively spared.
Mayotte is also the French department where the proportion under 25 is the highest.
“We are in a chase with the epidemic.
While it is moving at 200 per hour, we are going at 50 ”, he loses his temper with the Parisian.
"Confine to confine, it is useless," thunders the elected.
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Assuring to have "alerted in early January to say 'attention'", he would have wanted a plan to accelerate vaccination in Mayotte to be also put in place.
As in other overseas territories, injections took even longer than in mainland France to start.
The fault, in particular, with logistical difficulties to store and transport RNA vaccines.
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Mayotte is even at the bottom of the ranking.
Only 717 of the 290,000 inhabitants received at least one dose of vaccine on February 3, or 0.25% of the population (against 2.5% for the whole of France).
For the moment, only one has already received its second injection and is therefore truly protected.