You only need to briefly browse the websites of the local press to see this: several hospitals in France, in several regions, have triggered their white plan. Several hospitals in the Var, the hospital of Nantes (Loire-Atlantique), that of Abbeville (North), that of Lons-le-Saunier (Jura), and that of Noyal-Pontivy (Morbihan) have thus triggered the Plan White. They would be like this at least 19 hospitals in France to have triggered their White Plan these days according to our colleagues at BFMTV.
It must be said that the flu epidemic is off to a strong start this year and is in full swing, while vaccination has not been very successful, far from it. Result: busy if not saturated hospital services.
Each health establishment is thus equipped with a crisis system, called a white plan, which makes it possible to mobilize more resources in order to deal with an exceptional health situation. Triggered by the director or head of the establishment, who informs the State representative of the department concerned, the white plan includes several levels, to be adapted according to the health situation:
Concretely, measures such as the deprogramming of so-called “non-urgent” carethe transfer of patients, the mobilization of voluntary staff on rest, the establishment ofa crisis unitor the addition of additional beds can be undertaken depending on the health situation. In other words, exceptional situations require exceptional measures.
-The white plan was thus decreed in most hospitals at the start of the Covid-19 pandemic, but also in Paris during the attacks of November 13, 2015.
At the microphone of BFMTV, trade unionist Jérémy Beurel, FO deputy secretary of the Nantes University Hospital, believes that the flu epidemic, particularly virulent this year, does not explain everything. “We can talk about the flu epidemic, but we can above all mention the fact that, for years, we have had fewer and fewer beds in hospitals, fewer and fewer staff, and that, as a result, as soon as we have a peak in attendance, we are no longer able to absorb it properly, unlike a few years ago”, he said.
Let us remember that the vaccination campaign against seasonal flu, which started last October, will end on January 31. It is therefore still possible to get vaccinated, especially since the epidemic sometimes extends until spring.
