Continue to wear the mask as a necessary burden or lower it as a regained freedom? Since 1is August, the question is a matter of Cornelian choice which engages the responsibility, at least moral, of each one.
In fact, after an initial relaxation in March, the health law adopted at the end of July ratified the end of all the exceptional measures taken in the face of the Covid crisis, including the general obligation to wear a mask. The only reservation: a decree provides that the heads of health establishments – hospitals, clinics, practices, pharmacies, laboratories, nursing homes – or employers of people working with the elderly or sick can still impose it on their staff and the public. .
Another downside: the government continues to “recommend very highly” maintaining this “barrier gesture”especially in all closed spaces with high promiscuity – public transport but also shops, businesses and places of leisure – and if you are contaminated or simple contact case.
Common sense advice that is obviously not followed by the French. There are no precise data on the subject, but it suffices to look around to see it: the voluntary followers of the mask have become a minority which at best arouses astonishment, at worst irony or suspicion.
“Regain body with the pleasure of living”
A form of unconsciousness while the virus is still running and we fear an eighth wave for this start of the school year? “I would rather speak of carelessness linked to the desire to regain body with the pleasure of living in a heavy context, marked by the war in Ukraine and the climate threat, which puts the fear of Covid into perspective”tempers the sociologist David Le Breton, professor at the University of Strasbourg (1). “After being deprived for months of ordinary social relations, the French are rediscovering the pleasure of circulating with their faces uncovered, a major attribute of self-recognition and of others in our societies”he continues.
But isn’t this relaxation too costly from a health point of view? “Certainly, for the moment, the epidemic seems to be in decline, in particular thanks to the vaccine strategy, which is a success and which must be continued with the fourth dose. But mortality remains at a very high level: nearly 30,000 deaths since the beginning of the year. Can we be satisfied with it in the name of an alleged freedom when we know that the mask remains the best initial prevention? » deplores the epidemiologist Antoine Flahault, professor at the Faculty of Medicine of Geneva (2).
The first victims are immunocompromised people – transplant recipients, transplant recipients, dialysis patients, cancer patients… there are approximately 300,000 in France – whom vaccination does not protect effectively and who must therefore take all precautions to avoid contamination. “For them, the lifting of the obligation to wear a mask brings down an additional defense. This condemns many to confine themselves, in other words to exclude themselves from a society that no longer guarantees their safety. And the dead continue to accumulate in a pathetic indifference of politicians and public opinion.says Étienne Klein, director of the Ellye association, which brings together some 6,000 lymphoma patients.
“Essential to protect yourself and others”
Should the obligation therefore be reinstated? “Yes, but on the basis of health indicators and without neglecting other essential measures that we are still waiting for, such as the indoor air improvement plan promised by President Macron”recommends Dominique Costagliola, director of research emeritus at Inserm. “We could, for example, retain the threshold of 5,000 new cases per day, the probability of having a patient in a group of 25 then falling below 5% whereas today we have 10,000 new cases per day”, she pleads. Without having too many illusions: “By imposing the mask and then lifting the constraint without real rules of the game, the government has discredited this prevention tool for a long time. »
At the Bordeaux University Hospital, Professor Denis Malvy still wants to believe it. “When a crisis is so long and complicated to manage, appealing to everyone’s responsibility can make sense provided that decision-makers, the world of health and the media continue to educate people to clarify choices and remind us that , well worn in certain spaces, the mask remains essential to protect yourself and others. »
It remains to be hoped that this call for intelligence and solidarity will quickly find an echo with the French. Especially if the dark scenario of an epidemic resumption linked to a new variant comes true this fall and this winter, as envisaged by the former scientific council in its July opinion. A report which did not exclude, in this case, the restoration of “control measures” like wearing a mask.