The pulmonologist Irène Frachon, the originator of the revelation of the scandal of the Mediator in 2010, began to tell Wednesday in Paris court why she had "worried about the toxicity" of this drug, held responsible for hundreds of deaths . It was withdrawn from the market on November 30, 2009.
Why she "ticked"
For the first time since the opening of this river trial on September 23, the courtroom is packed to listen to the whistleblower, the most anticipated witness of six months of debate. It will take more than an hour of a very didactic presentation for Irene Frachon evokes this month of "February 2007", when she receives at the University Hospital of Brest "an obese patient, who suffers from a PAH (pulmonary arterial hypertension , ndlr) gravissime ", a very rare pathology of which she is one of the specialists.
"I realize she's under Mediator, why I tick, it's two things," says Dr. Frachon. To "an affair that has deeply marked" first, that of Isomeride, an appetite suppressant Servier laboratories, causing many cases of PAH in "young women", and which will be removed in 1997, like other fenfluramines, products derived from amphetamine.
"Doubts" and obstinacy
Irene Frachon also remembers the articles of the medical journal Prescrire, "railing against a real bludgeoning industry". Commercialized for thirty years as an adjunct to the treatment of diabetes, the Mediator is nevertheless "regularly reported in Prescrire as a derivative of amphetamine," said the witness.
For three years, Dr. Frachon investigated the Mediator and its adverse effects, diseases of the heart and lung, advancing in his research with "doubts" but also a lot of obstinacy. From her research, she pulled a book published June 2010: Mediator 150mg, how many deaths? .
Servier Laboratories, nine affiliates of the group and the National Agency for Drug Safety appear alongside twelve natural persons in this lawsuit for "aggravated deception" and "homicide and unintentional injuries".