COVID-19 – Students on the ground - Cyril Voisard (X2017)

“I joined the crisis cell of the Ministry of Health, in the anticipation taskforce, starting 

on March 16th.

I was initially involved in the modeling of the epidemic, in conjunction with the 

Institut Pasteur, to anticipate resource tensions (intensive care beds, ventilators, etc.) 

and plan strategic movement operations. The idea was also to set up indicators 

to assess the effectiveness of confinement.

Once the epidemic wave reached its plateau thanks to the confinement rules, 

the needs in this area were less significant and many teams of very efficient 

researchers are working full-time on this topic. 

Therefore, I gradually moved on to new issues revolving around EHPAD 

(elderly assisted living establishments), test strategies, and the establishment 

of a crisis management platform.

Beyond the operational and conceptual aspects which I find very enriching, 

I draw several lessons from this first month of my internship. I am aware 

that the context of the crisis and the current circumstances led me during 

the first weeks to discover in a privileged way the functioning of the public 

service, which was something I was largely unfamiliar with beforehand. 

I have learned a lot from those I have met and I have truly been able to 

benefit from this experience. I am also fortunate to experience the crisis 

management in a fairly transversal way, which allowed me to identify ways 

of proceeding, whether effective or less efficient.

I was struck by team spirit as a key success factor. I have been able to work 

with various teams, and I realize the difficulty of coming together around 

the same objective sometimes, but especially its effectiveness when it works.

I believe that this internship allowed me to make myself useful during a time 

of need, and I am now trying to take a step back and learn from this experience, 

both on a human and technical level.”