Nearly 70 patients and their loved ones have recently filed a criminal complaint following adverse effects of the contraceptive device Essure, which Bayer ceased marketing in Europe in 2017, AFP learned Friday from concordant sources. This complaint against X, at the health center of the Marseilles Tribunal de Grande Instance, refers to the facts of "involuntary injuries, endangerment and, possibly, aggravated deception".
Some have lost "their uterus, their fallopian tubes and even their ovaries". "We do not designate anyone to be angry, but these women who have been implanted and explanted, thus mutilated, are looking for answers," said Stephen Duval, confirming information from the Parisian . "Why did they lose, for some, their uterus, their fallopian tubes and even their ovaries?", He questioned, citing cases of women with six implants - when two are needed - and of others implanted despite their nickel allergy.
The lawyer calls for the opening of a criminal investigation so that "everything is observed", pointing to a "failure of the entire chain of care to the ANSM", the national agency for drug safety , alerted by patients. The public prosecutor of Marseilles, Xavier Tarabeux, "confirms the reception this week of this complaint which is under study".
A device under surveillance strengthened since 2015. The final and irreversible contraception Essure is a method of sterilization to introduce, by natural means, mini-implants in the tubes to trigger a healing that will obstruct them. The pose is done in the majority of the cases without general anesthesia. Marketed in France in 2002, the device was placed under enhanced surveillance in 2015 by the ANSM.
The pharmaceutical group Bayer had stopped "for a commercial reason" the distribution of Essure everywhere in the world, except in the United States, in 2017. The American market, where again the product was contested for its undesirable effects (bleeding, pains , strong fatigue, allergic reaction, depression ...), was concerned a year later. In this case, the laboratory is also targeted since 2017 by a group action involving several hundred patients.