The Health Minister Marisol Touraine Thursday refuted any lack of anticipation about the flu epidemic raging in France and assured that no hospital was overwhelmed, despite the influx of patients in several regions.
“We are passing the peak” , has she said on France 2. “Hospitals are facing a real tension but they are not overwhelmed, and they face their responsibilities and the needs of the French” . “Hospitals support offer very good conditions for all who need to be cared for” , she added.
The “results are there,” said Marisol Touraine on Thursday. “It’s already there and already more than thirty institutions, in addition to those who had already, who have been delaying non essential operations, which frees up hospital beds. ”
784,000 consultations in four weeks
According to the Sentinel-Inserm network monitoring, some 784,000 people have sought treatment for flu symptoms in the space of four weeks.
Asked to say if the numbers of the epidemic had not been underestimated by health authorities, Marisol Touraine said to have launched “the first call about the epidemic came on October 28 (…) asking that vaccinations be undertaken”.
“There is an anticipation because every year we know that there are risks surrounding the flu, we do not know when it will happen – it arrived early this year – and what we do not know this is what will be its magnitude but everything is ready with features that trigger at progressively ” , she said. “The situation is under control” .
A ministerial meeting on the epidemic is to be held at 9am this Thursday at the Elysee Palace in the presence of Marisol Touraine and the Director General of the Public Assistance Hospitals of Paris (AP-HP) Martin Hirsch.