Weekly French vaccination thread.
Another record week: 600,000 shots on each of the last 2 days and over 3,000,000 in 7 days.
France might make its target of 20m 1st jabs by 15 May - if it weren't for the Ascension holiday on Thurs and the “pont” (bridging day) on Fri.
BUT
1/8

The government is determined to hit the target. Vax centres will open to over-18’s from Wed if there are spare slots. Health minister Dr Olivier Véran has ordered centres to open until 10pm and demanded more weekend jabbing. He will join in himself every Tuesday evening.
2/8

Official figures suggest resistance to AstraZeneca is growing in France. By yesterday 91.5% of Pfizer doses had been used and 81.9% of Moderna doses. The take-up rate for AZ is now 55% - with over 3m doses (out of 7.4m received) unused.
See Vaccintracker graph below.
3/8

Opening up spare slots to over 18’s won’t use up the backlog because AZ is permitted only for the over 55’s. A problem of the government’s own making? Not really. The AZ clot scare was bound to have an effect in vax-shy France. 4/8