Thanks to the vaccination rate against the coronavirus, which allows “better control” of the virus, France can hope to spend “a relatively serene winter,” said government spokesman Gabriel Attal on Wednesday.
At the end of the Council of Ministers, he confirmed “a slight but noticeable resumption” of the epidemic. The “rate of reproduction of the virus, that is to say the number of people that an infected person in turn infects, [est] again above one “, with 5,400 cases detected per day on average, that is to say” an increase of almost 16% over a week “, even if” we are starting from a low level “, he added .
More than 80% of eligible French people are fully vaccinated
“The incidence rate again exceeds 50 per 100,000 inhabitants at the national level and the alert threshold has been crossed in about forty departments”, he added, linking these trends to the autumn climate.
At the hospital, “the number of hospitalized people and people in intensive care is now stable, it is no longer decreasing”, and “the number of admissions is progressing again”. However, underlined Gabriel Attal, “the vaccination coverage has something to make us optimistic: more than 80% of eligible French people are completely vaccinated”.
An “essential and urgent” reminder for the most vulnerable
It “allows us to hope for better control of the epidemic and even a relatively calm winter, because this vaccine protects very effectively and durably against serious forms”, he argued.
In this regard, he once again called on those over 65 and the most vulnerable to make their second recall, “essential and urgent”. Asked whether this third dose could become a condition in order to keep a valid health pass, he repeated that the government would base it on the recommendation that the health authorities will make in the matter “in the coming weeks”.