A misunderstanding and a communication error at the origin of the congestion of laboratories offering PCR tests? All over France, the queues have grown in recent days in front of these establishments. Among those forced to wait sometimes several hours to be tested, we find people who have discovered their contamination with Covid-19 with a self-test. The reopening of schools on Monday, with a health protocol based on these tests to be done at home, further lengthened these queues. And yet: the PCR test is no longer compulsory, neither to confirm a self-test, nor to confirm an antigen test.
This was the norm until recently - although it was not always met: each self-test or each positive antigen test had to be followed by a PCR test.
The information is also still present this Friday on the site of the health authorities.
Thus, when you type in your Internet browser the keywords "positive self-test what to do", you are first directed to a page from the Ministry of Health explaining that the performance of "a confirmatory PCR test" is "Crucial" in the event of a positive self-test, because it "allows the entry of its result in SI-DEP", the platform allowing the authorities to monitor the number of cases and therefore the epidemic.
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This rule is no longer in force, however, in the face of too many contaminations in recent days.
"It's been a week that we no longer ask people positive by antigenic tests to do a PCR test, we received a directive in this direction", confirms to the Parisian Philippe Besset, at the head of the Federation of pharmaceutical unions of France (FSPF).
"The instruction has been given to us by the DGS (General Directorate of Health) since Monday, to avoid congestion of the screening system", specifies the national president of the Union of biologists, François Blanchecotte.
A new rule discreetly communicated
Contacted Thursday morning on this subject, the Directorate General of Health was still not able this Friday morning to confirm this new rule to us. However, we find the trace in a "DGS Urgent" - a press release intended for health professionals - dated January 2 and specifying the new rules for the isolation of positive cases and contact cases. "In view of the intense viral circulation, it is no longer necessary to confirm by RT-PCR (
PCR test
) a positive TAG (
antigen test
) result", it is only written. As for the self-tests, “the result should be confirmed by a TAG or an RT-PCR test”, which also allows it to be registered on the SI-DEP platform.
The PCR test was until then mandatory after a self-test or a positive antigen in order to track down and monitor the Covid-19 variants, including Omicron.
It is the only sample that allows screening for the virus and therefore, for the authorities, to determine the nature of the contaminating variant.
The latter bent since the appearance of the Omicron variant to systematically screen each positive test.
But with the explosion of contaminations, the system has found its limits: Thursday, the DGS asked laboratories to no longer perform automatic screening, but only for at least 25% of positive PCR tests.
