“A more serious situation than last summer,” said Marc Noizet, president of Samu-Urgences de France. According to him, all of the French departments are affected. Added to this overstretch are seasonal emergencies in tourist areas that are underserved by healthcare centres.
“The situation is more serious than last summer because it now affects all departments of France, large services and small services. Last summer, we had red zones ”, declared on Europe 1, the one who is also head of the emergency service of the hospital group in the region of Mulhouse and South-Alsace.
For Marc Noizet, “the novelty is that extremely touristic areas […] are today in very, very precarious conditions”, citing Les Sables-d’Olonne (Vendée) or Arcachon (Gironde) “where they have been forced to set up a structure in the parking lot in front of the hospital where doctors do minor traumatology to alleviate emergencies”, or even Saint-Tropez (Côte d’Azur) “which almost closed its emergency department”.
“More pernicious”, according to him, “we close Smur, the part of the hospital which moves on the public road or to your home when there is a serious incident”, “sometimes for a night or a weekend “. “For example, around Angers, this extended weekend with the August 15 bridge, seven Smurs are closed, but it affects vital emergencies,” he added.
In the emergency room, as elsewhere in the hospital, “all the reinforcements that we were able to mobilize were”, and “the regulation of the remuneration of temporary workers did a lot of harm, even if it was a necessary evil” , said the president of Samu-Urgences de France. As for the medical regulation assistants (ARM), the first to get calls to the Samu and on strike in 69 of the 100 departmental centers, “they are poorly paid, have problems advancing in their careers and adequacy of their number by relation to flow,” he explained. “There is a real problem, the minister recognizes it, now things should move forward,” said Marc Noizet.
Visiting the Toulouse Samu on Monday, the Minister of Health, Aurélien Rousseau, declared that “some” of the demands of the striking ARMs were “legitimate” and that he intended “to work on it in the next few weeks”.
