Covid-19: Professor Raoult pursued by the Order of Physicians of Bouches-du-Rhône

Didier Raoult is being prosecuted by the Ordre des médecins des Bouches-du-Rhône which accuses him of several breaches of the code of ethics related to the promotion of hydroxychloroquine to fight against Covid-19, AFP learned Thursday, from his lawyer, who denounces an operation of "communication".

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Since the start of the epidemic, the defense of hydroxychloroquine by Didier Raoult, who heads the Mediterranean Infection Hospital-University Institute in Marseille, has sparked much controversy in the scientific world, in France and beyond.

The French-speaking Society of Infectious Pathology had notably seized in July the Ordre des médecins des Bouches-du-Rhône against the doctor, whom it accuses of having unduly promoted hydroxychloroquine.

Several reports of patients and doctors

The proceedings initiated by the Council of the Order of Physicians follow this referral but also several reports of patients and doctors, according to

, which revealed this new twist in the controversies surrounding Professor Raoult and hydroxychloroquine.

"All this is not law, but communication", responded to AFP Me Fabrice Di Vizio, believing that the release of his client would be "obvious".

The Order of Bouches-du-Rhône had summoned the professor on October 6, before deciding in a plenary assembly to file a complaint, according to the daily. 

Didier Raoult should appear "in a few months"

Didier Raoult should therefore appear before the regional disciplinary chamber of the Order of Physicians "in a few months", according to Me Fabrice Di Vizio.

This chamber, chaired by an administrative magistrate, can decide on sanctions ranging from a simple warning to delisting.

"The council of the order of physicians has nothing better to do while doctors lack everything?" Asked the lawyer to AFP.

In a separate press release, he believes that the ordinal institutions "have distinguished themselves by their silence and abstention since the start of the crisis."

"Does the Order still play its main role as a representative body of physicians or has it become a policeman of single thought?", Concludes the lawyer.

Professor Raoult has been conducting clinical trials for several months with his team in Marseille on this inexpensive and commonly used treatment for malaria, and says that it is effective.

But many scientists and the World Health Organization have criticized Professor Raoult's studies, saying they were not conducted according to standard scientific protocols.