Prepare, without worrying; reassure, without minimizing. The health authorities are definitely walking a thread with the new coronavirus ... The virus seems to have definitely escaped the cordon cordon erected around China. Exit, cases straight imported from the cradle of the epidemic. In Asia, South Korea sees the number of confirmed cases increase exponentially (they were barely 200 on Friday, here they are more than 600) and more distant countries, such as Italy (152 confirmed cases) or Iran (43 cases including 8 dead) must face local homes.
Read also: Coronavirus: the epidemic brings China off its pedestal
What about France? "Other cases are very likely. An epidemic? We are preparing for it, ” Health Minister Olivier Véran told the Parisian on Sunday. He indicated during a press point that there were no new cases in France, which therefore remains at 12 cases, including 1 dead and 4 cured. "We know that we must prepare for a circulation of the virus on national territory: the globe is a small village and the threat may present itself at our doors," said the Director General of Health, Jérôme Salomon, in the Journal du Sunday . Prime Minister Édouard Philippe took stock on Sunday afternoon with the Ministers of Health Olivier Véran, of the Armies Florence Parly, of the Interior Christophe Castaner and of Transport Jean-Baptiste Djebarri.
The authorities are mobilizing to deal with any eventuality. On Friday, the Ministry of Health reissued a methodological guide to “Preparing for the Covid-19 epidemic risk” intended for health, medico-social establishments and city doctors. "The risk of spread (...) is currently considered low if the" confirmed "cases are detected early and that adequate control measures are put in place immediately," the document said. For the moment, all cases must be dealt with “in authorized health establishments”, but “all health establishments” are instructed to prepare and the Centers 15 must be able to assume a tripling of the number of calls. The deployment of diagnostic tests throughout the territory "is being finalized" . Finally, "the probability of having to face an epidemic at Covid-19 exists" and non-serious cases should then be able to be diagnosed and managed in the city.
"And who cares about the risks [the liberal doctors] run? , protested in a statement the Federation of doctors of France. There are no FFP2 protective masks available from distributors, no protective glasses in the cabinets, no disposable gowns. The ministry's response: “Use the remnants of the 2009 H1N1 flu allocations”! (they have all passed the expiration date but we will discreetly ignore this annoying “detail”). ”
The shooting window narrows. This virus (…) is the number one public enemy and it is not treated as such
Tedros Adhanom Ghebreyesus, Director General of the World Health OrganizationThe authorities are aware of the difficulty of communicating. It is necessary, indicates the guide of the Ministry of Health, to inform the staff of care establishments because "the epidemic (...) could provoke (...) unjustified reactions during treatment (right of withdrawal of certain staff ...)" , as happened at the Brest University Hospital in early February. Faced with the general public, the government wants to keep the hand: only it "communicates on the announcement of confirmed cases, deaths, patients cured" , and possible or suspect cases will not be disclosed.
“The shooting window is narrowing. This virus (…) is the number one public enemy and it is not treated as such ” , worried Friday the director general of the World Health Organization (WHO) Tedros Adhanom Ghebreyesus, who keeps blowing hot and cold since the start of the epidemic. Several experts believe that it has entered a new phase, with cases with no clear epidemiological link with China. "The epidemic (...) has known a profound turning point in the past 48 hours," said Professor Devi Sridhar (Edinburgh Faculty of Medicine) to AFP. Others believe it is time to use the word "pandemic": "You are only cursed if you warn against something that turns out to be minor." But you're damned, and rightly so, if you don't warn about something that turns out to be serious, "say American risk communication experts Jody Lanard and Peter Sandman, on the blog of Australian virologist Ian Mackay, the University of Queensland.
The SARS-CoV-2 mortality rate is certainly lower than that of its big brother responsible for the SARS, but it is much more contagious: almost 80,000 cases in two months, where the SARS had done less than 10,000 between November 2002 and July 2003. And there is mounting evidence of transmission by asymptomatic patients. The hidden part of the iceberg could therefore be even larger than expected: in a study published Friday, researchers from the Center for Infectious Diseases of Imperial College London estimated "that about two thirds of the cases of Covid-19 exported from mainland China have gone undetected worldwide, potentially causing multiple chains of human-to-human transmission outside of China that have yet to be identified . ”