The Limited Times

Now you can see non-English news...

Covid-19: the incidence rate in France goes back above 100, a first for two months

2021-11-15T17:15:34.130Z


The situation "clearly looks like a fifth wave", alerted Olivier Véran, while many neighboring countries, already more affected.


Unlike several neighboring countries, France is not yet facing a real "outbreak".

But it is not spared by this resumption of the Covid-19 epidemic which affects all of Europe, far from it.

The incidence rate, that is to say the number of positive cases per 100,000 inhabitants over the past week, is increasing by nearly 40% per week.

It has even just returned above 100 this Saturday, or twice the alert threshold of 50.

All this "reflects an acceleration in the progression of the epidemic," warns Public Health France in its latest weekly bulletin, published this Thursday.

This situation "clearly resembles the beginning of a fifth wave", had already alerted Olivier Véran Wednesday evening, on TF1.

"The epidemic is not going to slow down"

More than one in three departments now has an incidence rate above 100, and almost all are above 50. The curve climbs in all age groups, and it is among young adults of Age 30 to 39 as its highest value.

What do the next few days have in store for us?

"I would rather tend to think that the epidemic will not slow down and even that the current growth is a little underestimated, because we still have an effect of inertia of the school holidays", points out the epidemiologist Pascal Crepey.

The start of the school year and the resumption of activity at the beginning of the week could thus accentuate this resurgence of the epidemic.

Moreover, noting that the flu epidemic had not yet really started in France, Pascal Crepey considers that the seasonality effect "is not yet at its maximum".

In winter, we tend to stay more in an enclosed space, which is often poorly ventilated, which is particularly conducive to contamination.

The sudden onset of cold in recent days poses an additional risk in the short and medium term.

"We urgently need binding standards vis-à-vis the quality of the air in confined spaces open to the public, this is perhaps, coupled with vaccination and wearing a mask, the measure completely. forgotten which can make the difference this winter ”, exhorts Antoine Flahault, director of the Institute of global health of Geneva.

Overwhelmed hospitals in Germany

A glance at the situation in some of our neighboring countries does not give much cause for optimism.

The incidence rate has now reached almost 300 in Germany, 500 in the Netherlands and almost 800 in Austria.

Each of them imposed new measures, sometimes targeting only the unvaccinated.

Austria, for example, intends to “reconfine” them, subject to the agreement of the Parliament expected this Sunday.

Some hospitals in these German-speaking countries are already overloaded with Covid-19 patients, which is not the case in France at this stage.

Hospital indicators have been increasing for several weeks, but they remain at much lower levels than in “previous waves”.

There are now more than 300 hospitalizations and nearly 100 critical care admissions every day, compared to nearly 1,000 and 200 at the previous peak at the end of August.

The previous wave, at the end of last winter, had much more impact on the hospital (up to 2,000 hospitalizations and 450 daily critical care admissions).

More vaccinated in France

If there are more positive cases every day, there will automatically be more and more new seriously ill patients and new deaths.

But the ratio of severe forms to all infected people is reduced thanks to vaccination, which protects above all against the risk of hospitalization.

"There is always a correlation (Editor's note: between increase in positive cases and increase in hospitalizations), but with a dropout because the risk of severe form is reduced", summarizes Pascal Crepey.

Read alsoVaccines against Covid-19: does the effectiveness against severe forms decline (also) over time?

France could also benefit from having vaccination coverage approximately 10 points higher than that of Germany and Austria. "I am not at all sure that vaccination can do much on the curve of short-term contaminations, but it will be different for that of severe forms", judge Antoine Flahault.

In addition to the use of the health pass authorized until July 31 and possible new restrictions, the extent of this "wave" in the hospital will also depend on the pace of the booster vaccination campaign.

The purpose of this is to "boost" the immunity which declines over the months, in particular against infection but perhaps also against severe forms.

Currently, just over 4 million people, the vast majority aged 65 and over, have received an additional dose.

This represents about half of those eligible.

Source: leparis

All life articles on 2021-11-15

You may like

Trends 24h

Latest

© Communities 2019 - Privacy

The information on this site is from external sources that are not under our control.
The inclusion of any links does not necessarily imply a recommendation or endorse the views expressed within them.