Accused of illegal practice of pharmacy and of fraud to the Health Insurance within the framework of a treatment against Lyme disease, pharmacists receive a 9-month suspended sentence.
The Strasbourg trial of the two pharmacists in the Lyme disease case started 2 years ago is coming to an end. This Thursday, the sentence fell: the two defendants are sentenced to two years in prison.
Health insurance fraud charge
The criminal court also condemned the first defendant Viviane Schaller, doctor of pharmacy and former manager of a biological analysis laboratory in Strasbourg, to reimburse the sum of 280,000 euros to the primary health insurance fund for “fraud” . The latter was accused of having falsified the results of official tests to carry out other analyzes, which she was being reimbursed by social security. Cost of the operation: more than 200,000 euros. Pharmacist Bernard Christophe, for his part, must pay the sum of 10,000 euros in damages to the order of pharmacists, for the manufacture and marketing without the approval of the health authorities of “Tic Tox”, an alternative treatment based on essential oils for Lyme disease.
Deficiencies in the medical world
Beyond the news item, this trial highlights the shortcomings of the medical world vis-à-vis a little-known pathology. Lyme disease is transmitted by ticks, which are found in our forests. It starts with a rash of the skin, and if left untreated, it can cause joint, skin, heart and neurological problems. Its incidence is estimated to be around 43 cases per 100,000 inhabitants, with disparities at the regional level.
Thus, Alsace and the Meuse have the highest rates. But for the Pr Christian Perronne, head of the infectious diseases department at Raymond-Poincaré hospital in Garches and member of the High Council for Public Health, heard at the Strasbourg court, in France there is a dramatic underestimation of the disease. “Serological tests have been calibrated so that there is never more than 5% of positive results, and this dogma has never been questioned for 30 years,” he said. He describes a kind of omerta in the medical world, with work on the disease struggling to get published.
It is in this context that Viviane Schaller falsified the results of the official test, because the protocol provides that a second test should only be performed after a positive or equivocal result of the first. As for the pharmacist, did he take advantage of the situation, knowing that antibiotic treatments for Lyme disease are not always effective because of resistance? In any case, the patients have taken the stand to testify to their suffering. Supported by many Lyme disease patients during their trial, the two defendants decided to appeal.
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