Covid-19: nursing homes in working order for the third dose

They say they are impatient to go back to the vaccination campaign. The obligation decreed by the government to administer to residents of retirement homes, from Monday, September 13, a third dose of vaccine against Covid-19 is welcomed with ” relief ” by professionals in the sector, even with “Enthusiasm” . “This third dose comes at the right time to stem concerns about the Delta variant”, welcomes Stéphanie Maigne, director of the Louis-Pasteur nursing home in Lempdes (Puy-de-Dôme).

Emmanuel Macron announced on July 12 and then confirmed on August 5 “A third dose for the elderly and the most fragile” in September. On August 24, the High Authority for Health (HAS) issued a favorable opinion for the injection of a third dose to people over 65 and to people with comorbidities, specifying that this recall should only take place after a period of at least six months following the complete primary vaccination. On August 26, Prime Minister Jean Castex set the start of the campaign in retirement homes for September 13.

Read also: The Haute Autorité de santé offers a third dose for people over 65

The aim is to ensure “Maximum protection” nursing home residents, recalled on September 8 Brigitte Bourguignon, Minister Delegate in charge of autonomy, closing the Assises of Ehpad. The next day, Professor Alain Fisher, president of the Vaccine Strategy Orientation Council, hammered home the message, during a live intervention on the Internet alongside Mr.me Bourguignon. “Several studies help to say today, he exposed, that for the elderly, there is a very significant drop in protective antibodies after about six months and a small increase in the number of cases in fully vaccinated people. It is therefore legitimate to strengthen the immune response. ” This third booster dose, he insisted, “Makes it possible to obtain, even in the elderly, a very strong protective immunity to a greater degree than what is obtained with the primary vaccination”.

“It will happen very calmly”

If this recall arouses the enthusiasm of the sector, it is also that the vaccination coverage made it possible to avoid new serious contaminations in retirement homes. To date, 89.9% of residents in nursing homes and long-term care units have received two doses. “Everyone understood the value of the first two doses because nursing homes were spared by the fourth wave”, observes Pierre-Yves Guiavarch, general manager of ACPPA, a group of associative nursing homes.

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