“I wish good luck to my successors who will have to manage a vaccination campaign.
Roselyne Bachelot knows what she is talking about when she answers questions from senators on September 17.
The current Minister of Culture, who held the morocco of Health eleven years earlier, embodies in his name the bridges between the vaccination campaign against the H1N1 flu at the end of 2009 and the current against the Covid-19.
Because of their magnitude, these two operations are often compared.
With a priority for the current government: not to reproduce the failures of 2009. Less than 5.4 million French people had been vaccinated on June 1, 2010, according to the conclusions of the specially created commission of inquiry.
94 million doses had been ordered and many of them had to be resold or simply thrown away.
"Vaccinodromes", the taboo word
At the time, the idea was to bring the patient to the vaccine.
This winter, the priority declared was to bring the vaccine to the patient, first in nursing homes.
The government did not want to build gigantic vaccination centers.
Such "vaccinodromes" had however opened their doors all over France in 2009, sometimes with long queues on the sidewalk.
The queue to get vaccinated in Paris, November 27, 2009.LP / Olivier Lejeune
Roselyne Bachelot herself had been vaccinated in a gymnasium in the 14th arrondissement of Paris.
But now, no minister has used this term which has become "totally taboo", summarizes the deputy LR Jean-Pierre Door, former rapporteur of the commission of inquiry on vaccination against the H1N1 flu.
"We should not recall the memories of 2009, but I have yet seen small gymnasiums open in my department," he squeaks.
We are accelerating the vaccination campaign:
➖ 100 hospitals with vaccines by tomorrow
➖ 100 vaccination centers intended for the city this week, 300 next week, 500 in January
➖ Beginning of vaccination for all French people over 75 years old before the end of January pic.twitter.com/kqxLZ1ZyaW
- Olivier Véran (@olivierveran) January 5, 2021
Because the government finally resolved, in early January, to announce the opening of vaccination centers.
But these are usually smaller.
"When it is the health professionals who put them in place in conjunction with local elected officials, we do not find this kind of huge places that we had in 2009", slips the doctor Luc Duquesnel, installed in Mayenne.
This general practitioner was at the time secretary general of the National Union of French General Practitioners (Unof), the generalist branch of the Confederation of French Medical Syndicates.
Once a week, he took the TGV from Laval to attend a meeting at the Ministry of Health.
“There was no videoconference and nobody had a mask,” he laughs today.
GPs this time "at the heart" of the system
The other big difference compared to eleven years earlier is based on the role of general practitioners.
Feeling "excluded" from the device at the end of 2009, this time they are "at the heart", announced Jean Castex at a press conference on December 3.
In particular, they assist the patient during the pre-vaccination consultation, which is not compulsory but recommended.
"It's day and night", relishes Claude Leicher, appointed president of the MG France union on December 5, 2009, in the midst of the vaccination campaign.
Now retired, he remembers an anecdote that occurred at the end of December at the Ministry of Health.
“Roselyne Bachelot's chief of staff took a slightly yellowed paper, waved it in front of my nose, presenting it as the secret service report showing that the severity of this flu was much greater than what some thought and that 'we had to save the vaccination campaign,' he says, still taken aback.
A caregiver is vaccinated, October 20, 2010. LP / Philippe Lavieille
The current Minister of Health, Olivier Véran, does not go a day without speaking about the vaccination campaign.
He is often assisted by the Prime Minister, especially during the traditional press conference on Thursday.
Often, it is to respond to tackles of oppositions.
Government spokesman Gabriel Attal has also made it a specialty.
The Minister Delegate in charge of Industry Agnès Pannier-Runacher completes this quartet "authorized" by the Head of State to speak officially on the subject.
Very discreet Darmanin
On the other hand, we no longer see Gérald Darmanin.
The Ministry of the Interior, yet omnipresent in the media at the slightest news item, only speaks out about the Covid-19 crisis to address restrictions and fines during curfews or confinements.
Eleven years ago, his predecessor Brice Hortefeux was more present.
He spoke in particular during a press briefing devoted to the logistical aspects of the vaccination campaign.
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In his eyes, the discretion of his far successor is a "mistake".
“One of the lessons of the 2003 heatwave was that the Ministry of Health was not equipped to deal with it logistically.
This was entrusted to the only organization that works on the ground: that of the Ministry of the Interior, ”argues this very close to Nicolas Sarkozy.
"I think he is wrong, the decision to open a vaccination center is taken on the decision of the prefect, who depends on the Interior, on a proposal from the ARS", replies Claude Leicher.
PODCAST. Is the vaccination campaign in France a failure?
More French people will certainly be vaccinated against Covid-19, which has already caused the death of 70,000 French people, than against the H1N1 flu and its "only" 323 deaths.
But the campaign will last for long months or even a year, in particular due to a lack of doses.
Jean-Pierre Door also sees "an excess of bureaucracy".
"At the time, it was done simply because there was no real consent, people who agreed to be vaccinated had only to come," said the deputy.
Except that after a few weeks, remembers Claude Leicher, "we brought card games to occupy ourselves because we were bored".
