Mr. President of the region
Mass vaccination of the French is an essential cog to get out of the coronavirus crisis.
With more than 11 million first-time vaccinated, France is still lagging behind many other countries, Great Britain, Israel or the United States, to name a few.
As president of the Provence-Alpes-Côte d'Azur region, with its 5 million inhabitants, you have decided to make your contribution by announcing Wednesday morning on RTL that you had contacted the Russian ambassador in order to to pre-order 500,000 doses of Sputnik V vaccine. An approach inspired by that implemented by the German Land of Bavaria, which has already ordered 2.5 million.
However, the European Medicines Agency (EMA) has not yet given the green light for the marketing of this vaccine in Europe.
You specified - for obvious public health reasons - that you would wait for the decision of the European authorities before administering Sputnik V. Except that the Russians sent their complete file to the EMA barely ten days ago .
The possible approval from the European Health Agency should, at best, not be relevant until July 2021.
Under these conditions, do you have a precise idea of the date on which you would be likely to receive these 500,000 doses?
And if they were indeed to be sent this summer to your region - at the same time when the government promises us a much more massive vaccination of the French population -, don't you fear ending up with a surplus of vaccines on your hands?
Especially since the Sputnik is based on the same technology as the AstraZeneca and the Janssen (its support is an adenovirus suspected of being at the origin of the very rare cases of thrombosis observed).
It could therefore, if validated, also be reserved for over 55s, a population that will have already been widely vaccinated by July.
Clearly, Le Parisien - Today in France would like to know: what is the point of pre-ordering a Russian vaccine without being sure to be able to administer it?
In addition, have you paid any sums to secure your pre-order and, if so, do you have guarantees to recover them in the event that the vaccine is not approved, or the delivery is not on schedule?
The mayor of Nice, Christian Estrosi, tells us that he did not pay a cent for the orders he announced he had placed on March 30.
Our readers are eager, Mr. President, to read your response.
Renaud Muselier's response: "To pre-order these vaccines today is to anticipate the competition of tomorrow"
Renaud Muselier, president (LR) of the Paca region.
AFP / Thomas Samson
Renaud Muselier, the president of the Paca region, was very quick to answer us.
"What's the use of stocking up on masks if you're not sure you need them?"
What is the point of being screened if you have no symptoms?
(…) What is the point of ordering vaccines ourselves if Europe takes care of them?
What is the good… anticipating?
He insists in defending his decision to pre-order 500,000 doses of Sputnik V without waiting for the green light from the European Medicines Agency (EMA).
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“Since the start of this crisis, this lack of anticipation has been the main cause of our failures.
For a long time, for my region, I made the decision to get out of this logic.
"And recall the measures already implemented:" Wherever our skills allowed, we took our destiny in hand: we provided 13 million masks to our inhabitants, we funded 19 rapid PCR test machines to hospitals in the region […], we are opening a vaccinodrome… No one had asked us for these initiatives at the Ministry of Health, but we carried them out in perfect coordination with the Regional Health Agency and the health authorities.
"
On the other hand, it is much less talkative about our questions about the delivery date of these vaccines.
“To pre-order these vaccines today is to anticipate the competition of tomorrow, he avoids, and to place himself on the waiting list if and only if this product is approved by Europe.
In this race against time, as since the first day of the crisis, I have chosen not to waste a minute for our 5 million inhabitants, ”he insists without giving further details.
He assures, however, that he has not disbursed public money for his pre-order: "Not a euro cent will be committed by then, and I invite, in this logic, the Minister of Health to pre-order him too: our effort must be collective.
»Advice that costs nothing.