A union of pharmacists denounces the cancellations of veterinary drugs and the conflicts of interest of this profession.
“It will be the next health scandal”. Gilles Bonnefond does not mince his words. The, president of the Uspo (1), a union of pharmacists, is worried about the overconsumption of veterinary drugs and in particular antibiotics. Because it is more than a thousand tons per year, twice as much as in human medicine. According to him, the risk is to see multiresistant germs transmitted to humans, which has already happened in the United States with Staphylococcus aureus.
And Gilles Bonnefond to denounce a major conflict of interest: veterinarians are partially paid for the products they prescribe and sell. In addition, checks are carried out mainly in pharmacies, while less than 5% of veterinary drugs are dispensed in pharmacies. Uspo has just written a letter to the Minister of Health and the Minister of Agriculture.
At European level, the Parliament calls on the States of the Union to put an end to the practices of coupling sales and prescriptions by the same person. In France, a plan to reduce the risks of antimicrobial resistance in veterinary medicine was launched in 2011 by the Ministry of Agriculture.
Listen to Gilles Bonnefond, president of the Uspo: “There are mishaps with antibiotics but also with other drugs”.
(1) Union of community pharmacists unions
.
