In a month, a new vaccination campaign against Covid-19 will begin in France.
5 million people will be invited to receive a booster injection, the health ministry said on Thursday.
Authorities prefer this term to third dose, since some people are considered - at this time - to be fully vaccinated after receiving a single injection (in case of a previous infection) or three injections (for immunocompromised people).
Read alsoCovid-19: a third dose of vaccine at the start of the school year?
Decryption of what awaits you
The people targeted are grouped into four categories: people living in nursing homes and long-term care units (USLDs), all those aged 80 or over, those with a very high-risk disease of serious form (the list is available from the Ministry of Health) and immunocompromised.
In total, 5 million people, including more than 4 million over the age of 80, will potentially be affected.
Appointments will be possible in late August or early September, government spokesman Gabriel Attal said on Wednesday.
The example of Israel
This list was communicated "subject to" the positions taken by the scientific authorities, and in particular the High Authority for Health. It must give a new opinion in the coming weeks. In mid-July, the authority had "taken note of the announcement by the President of the Republic of the establishment of a vaccination booster campaign in people who have been primarily vaccinated for the first time from January and February, who represent the most vulnerable and oldest population ”, but without further details. On the other hand, it was opposed to a campaign of vaccination booster shots in the general population, considering that the scientific data did not allow to conclude as to its effectiveness."There is no unanimous scientific opinion on the need - or not - to offer a booster dose to the entire population, nor on the [broader] categories that would be concerned," we said on Thursday at the Ministry of Health.
Israel, a pioneer in the field, has already been administering third doses to its population aged at least 60 since the end of July.
Since that date, a little more than 60,000 injections have been carried out each day on average.
Result: in two weeks, nearly half of the affected population has already received their third dose.
"We see in the data a decrease in immunity over time, even if we do not yet know very well the effect [that the third doses will have]", recently told us Cyrille Cohen, immunologist at the university. Bar-Ilan in Tel Aviv and a member of the Covid-19 Vaccine Clinical Trials Advisory Board.
The undesirable effects would not be more important than after the second injection and such a booster would be particularly very effective for the immunocompromised people, according to several preliminary studies published in recent days. According to The Times of Israel, the 50-60 year olds could be invited in their turn to be "transplanted" next week, then the 40-50 year olds. Not enough to satisfy the World Health Organization, which recommends instead to allow poor countries - and very late for vaccination - to perform more injections.
