“
I find it good that the Scientific Council ends at the same time as the state of health emergency,
confides to the Parisian, Jean-François Delfraissy, president of the Scientific Council.
It is both a return to freedom and proof that we know how to better manage this crisis.
“While the Scientific Council is living its last hours – the latter will close its doors on July 31 – its president takes stock of two years of monitoring an epidemic which still infects 55,000 people every day in France.
Read alsoAfter two years of the epidemic, the Scientific Council is living its last days
As early as February 2020, during a meeting at the WHO with Chinese scientists, the immunologist suspected that “
the crisis would surely be much more serious than we thought
”.
But “
he would never have believed that it would last so long
”.
This virus is “
a real bitch, it was in 2020, it remains so in 2022!
“, he confides in this interview, detailing his regrets but also his successes during more than 2 years of pandemic.
regrets and successes
His "
first regret
", which will follow him "
throughout his life
" is to have passed in June 2020, during the deconfinement in nursing homes, "
health above all, to the detriment, perhaps, of a form of humanity
.
“
My second regret is that we could have made decisions with the citizens
, he judges.
We could, for example, ask parents about the reopening of schools
”.
He also regrets that during this crisis the World Health Organization (WHO) “
did not take power over vaccines
”.
"
It is up to it to guide the industrialists and not up to them to say when they must be adapted
", he believes, describing
this "
lack of strategic and scientific vision " as a "
profound error
".
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"The Scientific Council will disappear and will be replaced by a new committee", explains Jean-François Delfraissy
On the “
success
” side, he is pleased that “
the excess mortality in France in 2020 and 2021
” is “
much lower than among our European neighbors
”.
“
What reassures me is that we have returned to the model of recommendation and no longer of prohibition
”, he adds, judging for example “
important to continue to wear the mask in the hospital , but it is now up to the French to choose
”.
After the end of July, a committee for monitoring and anticipating health risks, beyond the Covid, must take over from the Scientific Council.
“
I have no illusions.
We will have new tools, but we will be surprised by a new virus which will have other properties.
»