In the hospital, it would be necessary that “some contaminated and asymptomatic caregivers” may “work in areas dedicated to the care of Covid patients”, asked Monday, December 27 on franceinfo Bruno Mégarbane, the head of the intensive care unit of the Lariboisière hospital, before the health defense council which meets in the afternoon.
franceinfo: The government’s objective is to avoid overloading in the hospital, what is the current situation?
Bruno Mégarbane: We have three beds closed out of 18 due to personnel contaminated by Omicron. Of the 15 beds available, we have 10 patients with a severe form of Covid, including five in extremely serious condition with artificial ventilation and extracorporeal oxygenation devices. All of the patients are infected with the Delta variant, we do not have an Omicron variant, but we are particularly worried about the month of January. First, because the Delta wave will continue to progress in the hospital until the end of December. Then, because 10 to 15% of the beds are closed.
On top of that, there will be more staff absenteeism due to contamination and obviously this famous Omicron wave, the intensity of which we do not know. Today 65% of beds are occupied by patients with a severe form of Covid. Non-vaccinated patients represent 75% of intensive care patients. These are rather young patients, around 50 years old, without comorbidities. 25% of patients are older, around 10 years older, who have been vaccinated but are immunocompromised due to serious chronic illnesses.
You said you feared disorganization in the coming weeks because of the sick leaves of some of the caregivers, do you hope for the relief of periods of isolation?
Absolutely. In the current situation, the hospital cannot function. We must of course review the isolation situations in the event of contact, but for the hospital, we must even review the possibility for some caregivers who are contaminated by Omicron and asymptomatic, to work in areas dedicated to patient care. Covid. Otherwise, unfortunately, we have no room for maneuver and any staff absenteeism will result in a bed closure.
Doesn’t it seem paradoxical to you to lighten the isolation protocol, at the very moment when we are facing a wave of spectacular progress?
Yes, but this variant is obviously less dangerous at the individual level, especially when you are vaccinated and have received the booster dose: it is responsible for a flu-like syndrome, or even very few symptoms. , which could be compatible with normal professional practice. The people who will develop the pneumonic form are basically the unvaccinated people. But next to that, due to the massive number of contaminations, it could cause very old people to worsen an underlying disease and they would have to come to hospitals.
Paradoxically, it is a virus that is probably less virulent in vaccinated and healthy people but at high risk in older people. So it is necessary to facilitate the return to work but also to protect to the extreme other parts of society such as nursing homes and certain places of very high contamination with this famous combination of the vaccination pass and the negative serological test.