“We will mobilize additional arms” to ensure vaccination against monkeypox. This was declared on Monday July 25 on BFMTV by the Minister of Health, François Braun. “Healthy students” will be able to take care of these vaccinations, the ministry told AFP. A decree will appear this Tuesday, July 26 in the Official Journal to detail the terms of the project.
“To date, more than a hundred vaccination centers are in place, more than 42,000 doses have been destocked, more than 6,000 people have received this preventive vaccination”, underlined the minister, while elected officials and associations criticize the government’s attitude to the epidemic. “We have more than enough doses for the population which is mainly at risk and mainly affected by this disease”, assured François Braun.
A new center in Paris
The town hall of Paris called on Monday for “emergency measures” from the State to obtain more doses and personnel vaccinating against this disease, on the eve of the opening of a specific vaccination center in the capital which concentrates a large part of the French cases. This center which opens this Tuesday in the 13th arrondissement of the capital “will be able to very significantly increase the volume of vaccinations”, assured the minister on BFMTV. This Edison center, which will be open Monday to Friday from 9 a.m. to 6 p.m. and Saturday morning, will initially operate with around ten temporary health professionals, Anne Souyris, deputy mayor of Paris Anne Hidalgo in charge of Health, which aims “10,000 doses per week in Paris”.
This center comes in addition to the dozen hospitals and five sexual health centers (CSD) in the Ile-de-France region which already vaccinate. For the record: vaccination against monkeypox has been open since July 11 to men who have sex with men and trans people with multiple partners; to professionals working in places of sexual consumption as well as to people in a situation of prostitution. This consists of two injections 28 days apart. The level of efficiency would be 85%, informs the Pasteur Institute.
Additional recruitment could also make it possible to open a second specific vaccination site by the end of the week, finally added Anne Souyris. According to Public Health France, the capital region counted Thursday in number of residents nearly half (726) of the 1567 confirmed cases of Monkeypox in France. For Aides, 100,000 to 300,000 people need an anti-smallpox vaccination in France.
Elected officials and associations denounce the lack of means
For its part, Inter-LGBT protested against the “lack of preparation and transparency of the government”, citing “difficulties in making an appointment” for vaccination and “deliveries of insufficient doses”. Before that, the AIDES association for the fight against HIV had demanded last Thursday “the deployment by the State of a ‘punch’ vaccination campaign, relying on voluntary liberal health professionals” in particular established in “resorts”.
The government announced on July 8 the extension of vaccination to “men who have sex with men and trans people reporting multiple sexual partners”, to “persons in a situation of prostitution” and to “professionals in places of consumption”. sexual”. It was previously only offered to adults who had risky contact with a patient. Diagnosis of this Monkeypox virus is based on examination and questioning of the patient. Tests, including PCR, can also confirm the diagnosis.
The High Authority for Health decided on Monday for the reimbursement by Health Insurance of these detection tests, specifying that they should only intervene “in the event of persistent doubt after clinical examination”.