Watch out for this video claiming to show an empty Covid service in a Paris hospital

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“No nurse, no doctor, everything is empty. Where are the Covids?”, Advances the author of a video which shows empty corridors in a Covid department of the Pitié-Salpêtrière hospital in Paris. According to the APHP, there were however 13 occupied beds out of 25 in this Covid service, but the author of the video chose to film only the currently empty part.

In this video posted on Facebook last August 9 and shared more than 3,000 times, having also circulated on Twitter, a man films the corridors of a hospital after pushing open a blue door. On it, a sign reads: “Covid sector, access strictly prohibited”. We then see empty rooms and beds, and no nursing staff is visible. The author of the video then comments “Salpêtrière, Covid service. No nurse, no doctor, everything is empty. Where are the Covids?”.

“Thank you for making known what is happening behind the screen”, we can read in the comments, as well as: “The 4e vague, it is precisely the void “.

According to the caption of the video, the images date from August 6 and were filmed inside the Pitié-Salpêtrière hospital, located in the 13e district of Paris.

However, the number of people hospitalized for symptoms of Covid-19 remains high. According to government figures, 1,874 people were hospitalized in Île-de-France on August 10, far from the peak at 13,000 in April 2020. Several Covid indicators are nevertheless on the rise over the last 7 days in France.

“13 beds out of 25” on this floor of the Covid service

Public Assistance – Paris Hospitals (APHP), an institution on which the Pitié-Salpêtrière hospital depends, confirmed to France 24 Observers that it was indeed a video filmed in the Covid department of this hospital. . But, contrary to what the Facebook video suggests, it currently welcomes many Covid patients:

“This video was shot within the MIT (Infectious and Tropical Diseases) service located at 2e floor of the Laveran building of the Pitié-Salpêtrière AP-HP hospital. “

This floor contains 25 Covid beds, including 13 beds currently open, the author of the video filmed part of it where the beds were closed, and where there is therefore no nursing staff. “

The APHP could not give details of the author of the video but clarified that this wing is not locked. However, public access is prohibited, as specified by the “forbidden access” sign on the door crossed by the author of the video.

“It’s disrespect, after all we’ve been through as caregivers”

Lucie worked as a nurse in this service until last February and experienced the worst moments of the epidemic there. She explains to France 24 Observers that during the summer, it is common to have fewer patients and fewer nursing staff.

“It is common to close and open beds as needed in the hospital. The MIT service is also not only initially dedicated to Covid cases, but to infectious diseases in general. This is to be differentiated from the intensive care unit. Here we took care of people who were not in acute respiratory distress or who had returned from intensive care. ”

She said she was shocked by the comment on the video of the empty premises that circulated to her colleagues:

“We were disappointed and this video turned around a bit, it’s easy to film empty beds like that and to say that there are no patients … It’s disrespect, after all that we lived as caregivers. ”

On Twitter, the rumor was also fueled via the hashtag # Empty Hospitals and by another picture showing a series of empty hospital beds lined up supposed to illustrate the “emptiness” in the Parisian hospital. This photo is actually from April 2021 and was posted on Twitter by the director of APHP Martin Hirsch while the hospital canteen had been transformed into an intensive care room.

This is far from the first video supposed to show deserted Covid and resuscitation services to circulate on social networks. From the start of the pandemic, last April, the hashtag “film your hospital”, born in the United States, tried to prove that the Covid-19 was an invention. Also a few days ago, a video from the dialysis department of a hospital in Réunion was also shown. falsely described as a desert intensive care unit.