LUDOVIC MARIN / AFP
Health Minister Agnès Firmin Le Bodo is the target of an investigation for conflicts of interest.
POLITICS – She denies it. The Minister of Health Agnès Firmin Le Bodo, accused of illicit gifts received as part of her profession as a pharmacist, refuted to AFP everything ” conflict of interest “ this Sunday, December 31 on the sidelines of a visit to the Rouen University Hospital.
“On the matter to which you are referring, I am very calm”declared the Minister of Health who took the position of Aurélien Rousseau, who resigned after the adoption of the immigration law.
The minister is the subject of a judicial investigation for having received, as a pharmacist in Le Havre, gifts from Urgo laboratories, which were allegedly offered to her from 2015 to 2020 for a total value of 20,000 euros, according to Mediapart, which revealed the affair on December 21.
“Like 8,000 of my former colleagues, I will be heard in the so-called Urgo affair. I prefer to respond on the merits to the competent authorities, social networks are not the judges”she continued.
The minister “maybe” thought about resigning
For Agnès Firmin Le Bodo, in this matter, “there is no conflict of interest, no benefit in kind, no gift, there are commercial negotiations”. Has she considered resigning following these revelations? ” Maybe “she replied, before repeating being “very calm on the merits of the case”.
The gifts were offered by Urgo in exchange for a waiver by the pharmacist of a commercial discount from the laboratory to the pharmacy: this prohibited practice concerned a large number of pharmacists and the laboratory was sentenced in January 2023 to a fine of 1.125 million of euros – including 625,000 euros suspended – by the Dijon criminal court, after an investigation by the fraud repression (DGCCRF).
According to professional sources, the DGCCRF is investigating all pharmacists who accepted these gifts (watches, magnums of champagne, cast iron casserole dish, weekend boxes, etc.).
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