The Mediator scandal back in front of French justice
Marketed in 1976 for the treatment of diabetes, but widely misused as an appetite suppressant, the Mediator is accused of causing serious heart damage and numerous deaths.
AFP Photo/Fred Tanneau
Text by: RFI Follow
3 mins
The appeal trial of the Mediator health scandal, held responsible for hundreds of deaths, opens this Monday, January 9 in Paris, two years after Servier laboratories were sentenced to a fine of 2.7 million euros for "deception aggravated”.
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For Me Charles Joseph-Oudin, who accompanies 1,200 victims of the Mediator, the objective of the appeal trial which opens on Monday is twofold.
The lawyer hopes to obtain from the court the condemnation of the Servier laboratories and the increase of the indemnities charged to him.
He also wants the decision rendered to confiscate the profit made by the pharmaceutical group during the incriminated period to redistribute it to the victims present at this trial.
“
These Servier laboratories must not want to start over.
And the other laboratories must be very careful not to leave potentially dangerous products on the market with the prospect of a gain
, ”insists Me Joseph-Oudin at the microphone of RFI.
In March 2021, at the end of a river trial of more than nine months interrupted for several weeks due to the Covid pandemic, Servier laboratories and their former number 2, Jean-Philippe Seta,
had been found guilty
of "deception aggravated" and "manslaughter and manslaughter".
The Paris Criminal Court had notably considered that they "
had from 1995, enough elements to become aware of the mortal risks
" linked to the Mediator.
The second French laboratory, on the other hand, had been acquitted of the offenses of "unduly obtaining marketing authorization" and "fraud", to the detriment in particular of Social Security, which led the Paris prosecutor's office and civil parties to appeal.
In their wake, the pharmaceutical group had also appealed against the judgment.
Sentenced to a fine of 303,000 euros for having delayed suspending the marketing of Mediator despite its toxicity, the National Medicines Safety Agency (ANSM, ex-Afssaps) did not appeal.
A hundred witnesses summoned to appear
Marketed in 1976 for the treatment of diabetes, but widely misused as an appetite suppressant, the Mediator is accused of causing serious heart damage and numerous deaths.
The marketing of this drug, prescribed to around 5 million people, was suspended at the end of 2009.
This appeal trial will last until the end of June, with two and a half days of hearings per week, in the "major trials" room of the courthouse located on the Ile de la Cité in Paris, which received those the attacks of November 13 and then of Nice.
A hundred witnesses were again summoned to appear, including sixty at the request of Servier.
The pulmonologist Irène Frachon, who had revealed to the general public the extent of the health scandal, will also return to the helm.
For her, the judgment at first instance was “
the mountain that gave birth to a mouse
”.
“
The court decision was not at all up to the drama and the seriousness of the offenses committed
,” she believes, regretting that the court did not follow the requisitions of the prosecution.
“
The court released in an incomprehensible way for the facts of fraud, whereas it is the motive of the crime.
The only major official who had to answer for his actions, Dr Jean-Philippe Seta, was given a four-year suspended prison sentence
“, reproaches to RFI the doctor of the hospital of Brest-Carhaix (Finistère), who published on January 4 a comic strip recounting the scandal.
"
There's nothing going in the first trial and I'm not sure it's better in the second.
»
►
To listen also: Book France – “Mediator, a chemically pure crime”
The file includes "more than 7,500 civil parties" and a web radio will be made available to them to follow the trial, according to the general prosecutor's office.
Most hope to be compensated for the harm of anxiety related to the "aggravated deception" for which the laboratory is judged.
Only about a hundred cases seek compensation for “involuntary homicides and injuries”.
(
And with
AFP)
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