Will the skin soon be free for everyone? In any case, this is what Covars, the Health Risk Monitoring and Forecasting Committee, successor to the Scientific Council, recommends in a new opinion published this Monday.
Faced with “an active resumption of the circulation of Sars-COV2, a crossing of the epidemic threshold of influenza and an intense and early epidemic of bronchiolitis, as well as in anticipation of the upcoming end-of-year celebrations, a source of important intergenerational mixing”, he recalls the Committee and specifies that “the benefit” of a general port in such places “would be related to the three ongoing epidemics”.
Free Extended?
The Covars recommends “reinforcing accessibility” and recommends “making masks available free of charge in all places where they are needed”, as well as “limiting the cost and ensuring its distribution to all people who wish to use it, beyond care currently limited to severely immunocompromised people. Currently, the most vulnerable people, who can develop a severe form of Covid, can benefit from free masks.
“The mask is now freely accessible to the most fragile,” recalls the immunologist Brigitte Autran, president of Covars, at the BFMTV microphone.
“We have proposed, in this period in which the mask is really necessary and when it is used to combat, not only Covid but other respiratory infections, that this free of charge can be extended to the entire population”, details-t-ella, specifying that “the ministry is thinking about it.”
No recommendation on the obligation to wear a mask
However, if the Covars observe the “very low level of mask use on public transport and other closed places”, the Committee does not rule for or against an obligation, listing the arguments in favor of coercion (” messages of recommendation of low efficiency maintained “, etc) and against it (“perception of the limitation of individual liberties”…).
“We gave scientific arguments, and the minister and the executive made the decision not to make the mask mandatory,” Brigitte Autran said during a press conference, adding that “as Minister of Health, the use of condoms is not mandatory.”
Regarding vaccination, Covars advocates its intensification against Covid and the flu, with “incentivising and transparent communication aimed at the general population”, “reinforced communication aimed at caregivers about the benefits and limits of vaccination reminders” , forceful and rapid actions against certain populations, or the reopening of specific centers.
Source: BFM TV
