For the first time, the administrative court retains the responsibility of the State in the case of the Mediator. Justice believes that the drug agency should have withdrawn the Mediator from the market in 1999.
While the Mediator trial should open in 2015, the Administrative Tribunal of Paris has already rendered a first judgment on July 3. He directly blames the State for the faults committed by the National Agency for the Safety of Medicines and Health Products (ANSM). The latter is in fact accused of not having withdrawn the drug from the market in 1999, since the side effects and dangerous of the drug. benfluorex, the active substance of Mediator, had started to make itself known.
A victim asks for € 53,000 from the state
This particular judgment follows the complaint of a patient who used the Mediator between 2001 and 2009. Suffering from shortness of breath and edema, she asked the Administrative Court to jointly condemn the State and the ANSM to pay her compensation. of 53,000 euros.
If the Tribunal does not rule on this last request, stressing the need to carry out additional expertises, in order to assess the damage suffered by the complainant and to fix a penalty, it declares the State responsible for not having taken any action. with regard to the Servier laboratory. He also criticizes Afssaps (former name of ANSM) for having banned the drug too late, in 2009, when risks had already been reported to him.
It is the first time since the beginning of the case that part of the responsibility has been attributed to the State.
The trial in 2015
Marketed between 1976 and 2009, the Pick is an anti-diabetic drug that has been widely used to be prescribed as an appetite suppressant, which is said to have caused the death of between 500 and 2000 people. In France, it is one of the most serious and most publicized health scandals of recent years.
The decision of the Administrative Tribunal has no impact on the conduct of the great trial which will open in 2015, but it is the first to stress that the State cannot be exempted from its responsibility, by designating the Servier laboratories. as sole responsible.
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