Emmanuel Macron wants a vaccine for “
all French people who want it
” by the “
end of summer
”;
AstraZeneca vaccine is not recommended for people over 65;
and Sputnik V is increasingly being considered in Europe.
Le Figaro
takes stock of the latest major information concerning the Covid-19 epidemic in France and around the world.
Read also: Covid-19: the crisis reveals the weaknesses of French research
A vaccine for "all French people who want it" by the "end of summer"
The President of the Republic, Emmanuel Macron, assured Tuesday, February 2 on TF1 that France would be able to offer a vaccine to “
all French adults who wish
”, “
by the end of the summer
”.
He also estimated that, "at the
beginning of March
", the 80% of nursing home residents who so wish, or 500,000 people, will have been vaccinated.
AstraZeneca not recommended for over 65s
In France, as in Sweden, health authorities have indicated that they do not recommend the vaccine from the Swedish-British laboratory AstraZeneca to people over 65 years of age, due to a lack of data currently available on its effectiveness in this age group.
In France, this vaccine can be injected by pharmacists.
The variants worry France
The first results in the Paris region of the survey intended to assess the presence of the more contagious variants of the coronavirus in France "
are not good,
" said Rémi Salomon, president of the medical commission of Public Assistance-Hospitals of Paris ( AP-HP), evoking “
exponential growth
”.
"
We were rather around 6% on January 7 and we climbed to 15/20% last week
", detailed this doctor.
And as the English variant is “
40 to 70% more contagious, there will be an acceleration of the epidemic if we do not significantly do anything more (...).
That's what scares us
, ”he stressed.
The government called on employers and employees to “re-
mobilize
” to strengthen teleworking in companies.
Read also: Covid-19: contagiousness, lethality ... Know everything about the different variants
European Union considers Russian and Chinese vaccines
The President of the European Commission, Ursula von der Leyen, has shown herself open to access for Chinese and Russian vaccines to the European market on the condition that they submit to the assessment of the European regulator, according to parliamentary sources.
"
As soon as an authorization request is submitted by the producer
", declared Emmanuel Macron, "
the European and national authorities will scientifically examine this vaccine independently and, depending on the results, will approve it or not
".
Read also: Covid: could Russian and Chinese vaccines be authorized in France?
Sputnik V 91.6% efficient
The Sputnik V vaccine, about which Russia had been accused of lacking transparency, is 91.6% effective against symptomatic forms, according to results published Tuesday in the medical journal
The Lancet
.
1.54 million French people vaccinated
Four weeks after the start of vaccination in France, more than 1.54 million people received at least one dose of the vaccine.
Among them, a little more than 67,000 had received the two doses Monday evening, according to Public Health France which gives these figures with a day of delay.
100 million doses of vaccines administered worldwide
More than 100 million doses of Covid-19 vaccines have been administered worldwide, less than two months after the launch in early December of the first mass vaccination campaigns.
High-income countries (as defined by the World Bank), which only house 16% of the world's population, account for 65% of the doses administered so far in the world.
Apart from Israel, these are mainly North American, European and Gulf countries (United Kingdom, United States, United Arab Emirates, etc.).
WHO visit to Wuhan
Experts from the World Health Organization (WHO) arrived at the Wuhan Institute of Virology on Wednesday, as part of an investigation into the origin of the coronavirus in the central Chinese city, a report found. AFP team.
The institute has several high-security laboratories where researchers are working on coronaviruses.
The visit of the WHO is ultra-sensitive for the Chinese power, which seeks to evacuate any responsibility in the outbreak of the epidemic in 2019.
Read also: Coronavirus: Chinese power hinders a WHO mission
Pfizer expects $ 15 billion in vaccine sales
The American pharmaceutical group Pfizer estimates that sales of the anti-Covid vaccine, developed in partnership with the German company BioNTech, will reach around 15 billion dollars in 2021, a sum which could increase if the laboratory signs additional contracts.
French employees soon allowed to have lunch at their desk
Employees will soon be able to eat at their desks, in order to limit the possibilities of contamination with the coronavirus, said the Ministry of Labor.
A decree in this direction will be published
"in the coming days"
.
The measure was discussed Monday during a remote meeting between the Minister of Labor, Elisabeth Borne, and the social partners.
The Labor Code currently prohibits companies from
"letting workers take their meals in the premises assigned to work".
If a student is positive in kindergarten, the class will close
From now on, if a kindergarten student tests positive for Covid-19, the other students in his class will be considered as contact cases, which will
de facto
result
in
its closure, according to the latest health protocol published by the Ministry of Education.
In primary and secondary schools, wearing a mask being compulsory, the appearance of a confirmed case among teachers or students does not automatically lead to risky contacts in the classroom.
Unless it is established that it is one of the variants, in this case the concerned class will now be closed after a single case.
Until now, it took three infected people to decide to close a class.
Read also: Covid-19: class closures, masks ... What are the new health rules at school?
More than 2,200,000 deaths worldwide, 600,000 deaths in Latin America
The Covid pandemic has killed at least 2,237,990 people around the world.
More than 600,000 deaths from Covid-19 have been officially recorded in Latin America and the Caribbean since the start of the pandemic in December 2019. The United States is the most affected country in terms of both deaths and cases, with 446,733 deaths, followed by Brazil (226,309), Mexico (159,533), India (154,486) and the United Kingdom (106,564).
The global death toll is globally underestimated.
It is based on the daily reports from the national health authorities.