Faced with the increase in contamination, the autumn vaccination campaign against Covid was brought forward to start on Monday. If the most vulnerable are concerned as a priority, the vaccine is also accessible to healthy people.
“As I am in good health, for the moment, I do not think of getting vaccinated if there is no obligation”, “It no longer worries me, I think there is less risk of a serious form”. For these passers-by met in Lyon, vaccination against Covid seems to belong to the past. “There is a general fed up, says a pharmacist. Young people don’t care!”
>> Covid-19: test, isolation, teleworking… What are the rules to follow if you test positive?
However, in the streets, masks have returned to the faces of passers-by, with an upsurge in cases. Although there is no longer a centralization of the number of cases at the national level since the beginning of the summer, SOS Médecins observes a 12% increase in home medical visits linked to Covid from September 18 to 24, compared to the previous week. The fall vaccination campaign has therefore been brought forward, to start Monday October 2, instead of October 17, i.e. two weeks before the planned date.
“A trivialization of the disease”
“We have been doing some tests again since the beginning of September because there are more cases, points out a pharmacist from Lyon. People don’t have masks and barrier gestures, they have somewhat forgotten them. They come to test themselves just to know and to protect those around them a little if they have elderly parents, if they are around people at risk. It is rather a trivialization of the disease which is less frightening.”
>> Covid-19: why has it become so difficult to know where the epidemic is?
If the delivery of the new vaccines encourages people to register, these are mainly elderly or immunocompromised people. “We have an increase in requests, a growing waiting list, of people waiting to be vaccinated, possibly with the flu. These are populations at risk, confirms a pharmacist, in another Lyon pharmacy.
“Young people are getting vaccinated less than before, they prefer natural immunity in general. They consider that they have been vaccinated enough. There is no particular concern, people are starting to get used to Covid .”
A pharmacist from Lyonat franceinfo
A period of six months since your last injection
The people primarily concerned by this fall vaccination campaign are “the most fragile”according to the Ministry of Health, i.e. those over 65 and those suffering from comorbidities, having a higher risk of a serious form of the disease, as well as immunocompromised people, pregnant women, people who reside in nursing homes and in long-term care units.
Those who live nearby or in regular contact with vulnerable people are strongly encouraged to receive a new injection. But it is possible to get vaccinated, even if you are not part of the priority target groups. A period of six months must have passed since your last injection of an anti-Covid vaccine, reminds the Directorate General of Health.
It is possible to get vaccinated at your GP, in a pharmacy, from a nurse, a midwife or a dental surgeon. For residents in nursing homes and long-term care units, vaccination is organized by your healthcare establishment.