François Braun did not miss the opportunity to weave his laurels.
Asked on Tuesday, September 27 on France Info about the monkeypox epidemic, which is clearly marking time in France and around the world, the Minister of Health said that the World Health Organization (WHO) had congratulated France for its management of the epidemic.
France would even have been “recognized by the WHO as the country that reacted best”, he argued.
🗣 Monkey pox ➡️ "The situation is getting better. We have vaccinated more than 110,000 people. The number of contamination cases is falling day by day, so yes, we can say that things are getting better", defends the Minister of Health pic.twitter.com/nJ3uoAyYCy
— franceinfo (@franceinfo) September 27, 2022
We couldn't find a public statement from the WHO on this.
And for good reason: the entourage of the Minister of Health tells us that the international body would have expressed itself in this way during "private exchanges" with the French health authorities, the General Directorate of Health (DGS), its boss Jérôme Solomon, etc., and at internal meetings.
When contacted, WHO was unable to confirm or tell us more.
France, champion of vaccination in Europe… but overtaken by the United States
Certain factual elements allow, however, to highlight the French strategy against monkeypox.
And in particular vaccination, the beginnings of which were highly criticized by associations.
With nearly 110,000 doses of vaccine administered in total on September 29, France is the European “champion” and one of the most advanced countries in the world.
In the United Kingdom, just over 45,000 doses had been administered by September 20, compared to around 100,000 on the same date in France, according to the British health agency.
The two countries have almost the same population, but the estimated number of inhabitants eligible for vaccination against monkeypox is higher across the Channel (111,000 versus 250,000).
In Germany, just over 20,863 vaccinations had been carried out at the end of August, compared to 45,000 in France (which has 20% fewer inhabitants) on the same date.
Read alsoMonkey pox: why we still don't know the real effectiveness of vaccines
However, outside of Europe, the United States is well ahead.
More than 800,000 doses of vaccine were administered there, ie 50% more than in France by reporting the figures to the population.
A large quarter of them are second doses, more than in France because the 28-day period separating the two injections was extended in July.
On this sole criterion of the number of vaccinations carried out, we cannot therefore say that France had the "best" response.
“We are still quite far from the vaccination objectives of the most exposed populations.
France is doing better than many others today, but we must not declare victory too quickly”, reacts Sébastien Tüller, LGBTI manager at Amnesty International France.
"Talent is above all when you have it and you don't say it"
Anyway, this kind of classification is far from unanimous.
“I always struggle with the contest of who is the best.
Talent is especially when you have it and you don't say it, ”judges a government source.
During the Covid-19 pandemic, only private institutes such as the Deep Knowledge Group or the Lowy Institute attempted to "rank" countries according to the quality of their health crisis management, with a methodology that has sometimes been criticized.
One of François Braun's predecessors as Minister of Health, Olivier Véran, himself did not always make the same speech when it comes to such comparisons.
"I don't care if there are three countries, five countries or eight countries that have vaccinated more (against Covid-19 than France)", he said on April 1, 2021. However, "apart from England , France is the country in Europe which vaccinates at the most sustained rate”, welcomed the current government spokesperson a few weeks earlier.
