“The hospital will cope”, assures the Minister of Health Aurélien Rousseau

2023-08-18 15:54:00

France is affected by a very intense wave of heat wave. While the situation is “tense” in the emergency room, the Minister of Health wants to be reassuring.

LC with AFP

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The Minister of Health Aurélien Rousseau assured that “the hospital will face” the episode of heat wave which has started and will intensify in the coming days.
© Fred Dugit / MAXPPP / PHOTOPQR/LE PARISIEN/MAXPPP

Published on 08/18/2023 at 5:54 p.m.

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AWhile the heat of July has already caused excess mortality compared to normal, the heat wave which is expected to hit the country in the coming days is not to reassure the French. Twenty-eight departments are now placed on orange “heat wave” vigilance from this Saturday, August 19, and the emergency situation during this holiday period is particularly “tense”. However, the Minister of Health Aurélien Rousseau wants to be reassuring, saying that the “hospital will cope” and that the current emergency situation is not “more serious” than in 2022.

“The hospital has coped, the hospital will cope, […] the organization of the health system, it is extremely robust and it will be robust in the face of this episode of heat”, declared the Minister of Health Aurélien Rousseau on France info. In hospitals, forced to close or “filter” the entrance to many emergency services in the face of a lack of caregivers, practitioners fear a new influx of patients. Several representatives of emergency physicians this week judged the extent of these closures “more serious” than in 2022.

READ ALSOHeat wave: seven tips for staying cool without air conditioning“I would not say that the situation is more serious,” replied the Minister of Health. “She is still tense, and she will be tense following the summer too, there will not be a return to normal all of a sudden. We have a problem of availability “of caregivers, he continued.

Closures justified by the minister

” It’s true […] that we have zones of tension everywhere on the territory, but today we anticipate them better. “Going through number 15 means that no Frenchman who needs treatment has gone without a medical response,” assured Aurélien Rousseau.

He recalled “the reflex” to have: “At the slightest discomfort, […] we call 15.” This summer, “hospitals and in particular university hospitals have played their role as a platform and support for smaller hospitals which, sometimes, cannot hold on”.

READ ALSOHot, cold or spicy: what to drink or eat in the heat waveTargeted one-off closures make it possible to have “hospitals that remain open during the day” or closed only “in deep night”. “It’s not satisfactory”, but it “makes it possible to maintain, in territories where we might no longer, offer care”, he said.

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