He repeats it twice: his speech “may be inaudible”, he knows it. Despite the war in Ukraine, the presidential election, “normal” life regained, Gilles Pialoux makes his voice heard in the midst of the media din to express his concern. Asked by BFM on Monday, the head of the infectious and tropical diseases department at Tenon hospital in Paris was very clear: “The French will have the waves they deserve”.
It implies that if no one continues to respect barrier gestures even a little, the virus will continue to circulate in the next weeks. Because the contaminations are on the rise again in the countrywhile most health constraints have now been lifted for a week.
“Paradoxical” decisions by the government
“Removing an obligation is not inadvisable as a prevention tool, recalls the professor about wearing a mask. People at risk, and there are many of them – 11% of those over 80 who are not vaccinated, 10% of those over 65 who are immunocompromised – are in constant contact with two, three or four people around them. So in the end, that’s millions of people to protect. »
Gilles Pialoux is also surprised by the “paradoxical” decisions of the government. “There is no longer an obligation, but there can be health advice. There is a paradox between the politician who says: We remove everything, we stop everything, and the campaigns of the Ministry of Health and Public Health France which say to continue to put on the mask to protect the most fragile or to protect themselves. It comes down to individual responsibilities. »
The doctor concedes all the same that “for the moment”, the hospitals are “effectively” not at all filled. “The hospital pressure has stabilized, it has stopped decreasing. We never went to zero, we permanently have four to five patients in intensive care, and we will see how far it will go up in the spring. As the scientific council said, we thought we would have a concern in October. There, we have a vigilance on the spring. But you understand that this speech may be inaudible. »