It's not yet a return to normal, but the decline is spectacular.
According to the latest data from the Research, Studies, Evaluation and Statistics Department (Drees), published this Thursday, last week, 3.24 million RT-PCR and antigenic tests were validated by a healthcare professional.
A balance sheet down 29% compared to the previous week.
Read alsoCovid-19: has the cost of screening tests really exceeded one billion euros per month?
In detail, 1.94 million antigenic tests were validated this same week.
In addition, the daily number of samples has fallen sharply: while an average of 1.7 million tests were carried out each day at the beginning of January, this number fell to 436,000 last week.
Enough to release the pressure on laboratories and pharmacies, which have been in high demand in recent months.
Visible in all age groups, the decline is “
particularly marked among those aged 65 or under
”, notes the Drees, which adds that the changes in the “
health protocol in schools
” and the winter holidays have also reduced the request for saliva RT-PCR tests.
Antigenic tests are particularly used by those under 25, and in certain territories, such as Guadeloupe and Martinique, where they weigh more than eight out of ten tests carried out.
A steady pace
The Omicron wave has taken demand to levels not seen since the start of the pandemic: in January, more than 45.7 million tests were carried out, of which more than two-thirds were antigenic.
Over the first three weeks of February, this number was divided by three, with 13.3 million tests validated, 62% of which were antigenic.
A rate certainly lower, but still higher than the levels observed before the emergence of the Omicron variant, in November.
The test campaign remains massive in France, representing both logistics and significant cost: in January, the final bill should exceed 1.5 billion euros, according to Bercy, unheard of since March 2020. Almost all of the envelope planned for 2022 will therefore have been consumed in just one month.
In total, since March 2020, France has validated more than 265.5 million tests.
