Thread by @john_lichfield

Weekly French vaccination thread.
France’s vaccination rate hit a new record this week – 581,708 a day – even though 1st doses slumped.
Second doses and complete vaccinations (not quite the same) are booming. But demand for 1st doses is slackening, as forecast last week. 1/12

First doses, though reasonably high, are being eroded by complacency (as the pandemic falls away) and by resistance from the vax-shy and vax-lazy in older age groups. 1st shots are now averaging 268,772 daily - short of the 306,000 needed to reach 40m first vaxes by 15 July. 2/12

BUT...
PM Jean Castex shifted the goalposts (without anyone noticing much).
He gave end-Aug as a new deadline for 40m 1st jabs – which is Extremely Unambitious (about 112,000 shots a day, below half the current rate). He also said he expected 35m to be fully-vaxxed by then. 3/12

These figures only make sense if the government a) plans to give priority to 2nd jabs in coming weeks and b) expects a severe slackening of demand for 1st jabs as the holiday season starts. They are certainly a shift in strategy – unnoticed it appears by much of Fr media.
4/12

Some people object if I make comparisons with the UK in these threads. I don’t wish to denigrate the UK effort, which has been exemplary. I do wish to counter propaganda in parts of UK media which still insist that French/EU efforts are “shambolic”, “embarrassing etc. 5/12

Thus…
For a 3rd week the daily vax rate in France was ahead of the UK: 581,708, compared to 443,639. As the World in Data graph shows, G and I are doing even better pro-rata. EU vax levels – now that doses are available – have matched/surpassed the highest levels seen in UK
6/12

The UK WAS faster off the mark and remains far ahead – 42.4m 1st doses, compared to 31.7m in Fr.. But the EU’s early efforts were hamstrung by AstraZeneca’s abject supply record. A Belgian court ruled yesterday that AZ SHOULD have used UK factories to reduce the shortfall. 7/12

France has now given 31.7m first shots, which is just over 60% of adults. Separate figures for 12-17 years olds, now eligible, have yet to be published. The figure for the “totally vaccinated” – including 3 shots for some and 1 for others - is 17,847,833 or 34.3% of adults.
8/12

To hit the new target of 35m fully vaccinated by 31 Aug, Fr.will have to complete 17.2m vaccinations in 74 days – over 235,000 a day. That should be easy enough. Full vaccination means 2 doses for most; 3 for those with certain health probs; and 1 for those who had Covid. 9/12

I am, however, suspicious about the new targets. Officially, the govt says the vax programme must accelerate – “vaccinate, vaccinate vaccinate,” Castex says - to counter the threat from Delta variant. The new targets represent a substantial slowing on present vax rates. 10/12

As things stand, the Delta variant (formerly known as Indian) is a small % of French cases, either 1% or circa 3% depending on the testing/tracing procedure applied. But it is spreading quite fast. It is already over 90% of cases in the UK. 11/12

In the meantime, the pandemic (with over 86% of cases still UK variant) has almost melted away in France. The average number of new vases daily has fallen to 2,719 (compared to 40,000 in April).
Fingers crossed for a good summer…
12/12