A vaccination center, in Paris on May 15, 2021. – Eric TSCHAEN-POOL / SIPA
While the restrictions are gradually easing, France marks an important turning point on Monday in its fight against the spread of the coronavirus. No more age or state of health criteria, the entire adult population of the country is now eligible for vaccination against Covid-19.
“I am totally convinced that we will see a lot of people get vaccinated,” said LCI Alain Fischer, the government’s “vaccines man”, qualifying this new expansion of the campaign as a “key step” to protect the population. and “to return to an increasingly normal life”. Candidates will nevertheless have to be patient: reservations, which started on Thursday, are arriving “gradually” on specialized Internet platforms (Doctolib, Keldoc, Maiia), according to the Minister of Health, Olivier Véran.
A limited number of doses
With “28 million adults eligible for vaccination and not vaccinated” for “an average of 500,000 appointments available each day”, Doctolib warned that it could not respond to all requests given the “still limited number of doses of vaccines, including Pfizer and Moderna ”. While a new acceleration of deliveries is expected in June, with 76.7 million doses expected after 44.5 million in May, “we must go even faster”, for his part estimated the mayor (PS) of Nantes Johanna Rolland on France 3. There are “still too many people” waiting for an appointment, she judged.
The number of professionals mobilized would make it possible to “vaccinate more. The question is the supply ”, assured the president of France Urbaine, federation of agglomerations. “Without massive vaccination, the epidemic could start again”, because “the arrival of new more transmissible variants” increases the proportion of the population which must be vaccinated “to prevent the circulation of the virus”, also warned in the JDD Arnaud Fontanet, epidemiologist at the Institut Pasteur. A justified caution, according to Alain Fischer, who observes that “the curves are going in the right direction” but that “we are not entirely immune” from a recovery.
Indicators are improving
Health indicators continued to improve on Sunday, with 8,541 positive cases recorded across the country, while 16,775 Covid-19 patients were treated in hospital, including 2,993 in critical care services, the lowest figure since at the end of January. “If the decline continues until June 9, the next step in the lifting of restrictions, we will have a quiet summer,” said Arnaud Fontanet.
So far, 25,431,357 people have received at least one injection (38% of the total population and 48.4% of the adult population), of which 10,777,150 people have received two doses. As of June 15, “there is a good chance that we will be beyond the government’s target of 30 million first-time vaccines,” said Alain Fischer.