“At this rate, we are heading for disaster”. So has analyzed northern Paris Bichat hospital (AP-HP) head of ICU Jean-Francois Timsit on Tuesday March 23, 2021 in Le Parisien. The doctor first and foremost intends to sound the alarm about the Covid-19 epidemic situation in Île-de-France: with an always-increasing incidence rate and a continuous flow of Covid-19 sick in hospital services, “the epidemic is getting carried away, all indicators skyrocket”, Regional Health Agency (ARS) director Aurélien Rousseau tells Le Monde.
This past Thursday, the government announced strengthened health restrictions looking like a third lockdown in Île-de-France, including “additional curbing measures” to halt the epidemic. A decision made several weeks after the epidemic markers started to worsen in the capital area and in other departments involved.
In details, the epidemic surge is real: as of Tuesday March 23, 2021, the incidence rate reaches an average 549 cases for 100,000 inhabitants in Île-de-France. Two weeks ago, the same rate reaches 350 – and already close to the reinforced alert threshold. Even worse, in Seine-Saint-Denis, the department the hardest hit by the epidemic in France, the incidence rate skyrockets to 683 cases.
Overwhelmed hospital units
Moving on to hospital units, caregivers start to suffer from the fall-outs of such an epidemic surge noticed for weeks. ARS director agrees wholeheartedly with it: after requiring to cancel 40% of surgeries and care that were not related to Covid-19, he thinks that “we might have to go further and cancel even more surgeries, but it raises major problems”. So far, 1,325 Covid patients suffering from severe disease are hospitalized in the region’s intensive care units. Paris hospitals are expected at least 1,530 Covid-19 sick in the coming days.
Of course, caregivers grow worried, they can see a scenario similar to this past Fall’s, during the second wave, coming up. “We are not at the breaking point, but we move a lot to it. We feel like we are very close”, Head of AP-HP Cochin hospital pneumology unit Nicolas Rocher tells BFMTV. “There are thresholds that are anticipated and likely to increase again. But it is getting tighter”, the doctor adds. Same massive concerns for Timsit, very pessimist about the future. “We may have to put sick in corridor, to double rooms up, even for the most severe situations”, he explains. For the time being, the government has announced no further restrictions.
