France is preparing “for all scenarios”. 232 vaccination sites are already open in the country to deal with the mpox (formerly known as monkeypox) epidemic, outgoing Prime Minister Gabriel Attal said on Tuesday as he pledged 100,000 doses of vaccines to the worst-hit countries.
“We are ready to face all scenarios and all risks,” he wrote on X (formerly Twitter). On Friday, he announced that the French health system was put in “a state of maximum vigilance”.
A new meeting was held in Matignon on Monday afternoon. To date, no contamination of clade 1, more deadly and virulent than clade 2, has yet been registered in France, the government clarified in the evening. In Europe, Sweden announced that it had registered a case of subtype clade 1b, which recently appeared in Africa, and France expects cases to appear on its territory.
The Pasteur Institute said it was ready on Monday to “test and vaccinate patients at the request of the French authorities”. »232 vaccination sites are already open across the country. And many others will be available,” said Gabriel Attal.
200,000 doses sent out in Africa
“As requested by the President of the Republic, France will donate 100,000 doses of vaccine,” he also indicated. “These doses will be distributed via the EU to regions where the virus circulates strongly.” These donations will “strengthen current European efforts by almost 50%”.
Last week, the African Union’s health agency Africa CDC announced that around 200,000 doses would be distributed in Africa thanks to an agreement with the European Union (EU) and the Danish pharmaceutical company Bavarian Nordic, whose vaccine to prevent the disease has been approved since 2019.
“At my request, the Ministry of Health contacted the High Authority for Health to update its vaccination recommendations before the end of August,” Gabriel Attal further explained. In its last statement from January 2023, the HAS only recommended vaccination for people who have been in contact with patients if the number of cases remained “isolated or scattered”.