After five months of hearings, the Mediator’s appeal trial ended on Thursday June 8 in Paris, after a final day of pleadings during which the representatives of the Servier laboratory and its lawyers repeated that it had acted ” in good faith “.
“We never wanted to deceive anyone”hammered the representative of the group, Isabelle Tupinon-Mathieu, for her last words at the bar, assuring the victims of her “deepest regrets”.
“I didn’t understand fast enough”then lamented the group’s ex-number two, Jean-Philippe Seta, his voice charged with emotion. “I want to repeat to the victims and their families (…) that there was never any will, any intentionality” to conceal the dangers of the Mediator, he added. The group’s lawyers had previously pleaded for release, saying that the laboratory would never have “knowingly put a dangerous drug on the market with full knowledge of the facts”. The decision will be made on December 20.
Marketed in 1976 as an adjunct to antidiabetic treatments, but often improperly prescribed as an appetite suppressant until it was banned in 2009, Mediator has caused serious cardiovascular effects in thousands of patients. He is held responsible for hundreds of deaths. At first instance, in March 2021, the second French pharmaceutical laboratory was sentenced to a fine of 2.7 million euros.
The criminal court had found him guilty of “aggravated deception” and “manslaughter and involuntary injuries”, but had acquitted him for the offense of fraud and declared prescribed that of “undue obtaining of marketing authorization. market “.
Last week, the public prosecutor’s office claimed against Servier the payment of nearly 200 million euros: a fine of 13.5 million euros and the “forfeiture of profit” linked to the drug, i.e. up to 182 million euros according to his calculations.
“hypothetical risk”
François De Castro, one of Servier’s lawyers, castigated a “severity (…) totally out of step with the reality of the case”accusing the prosecution of a “misunderstanding” of the last.
On Wednesday, his colleague Nathalie Carrère said to herself “shocked” by the words “of rare violence” of the public ministry. She had regretted a search for “sensationalism” in the use of the word “poisoning” – criminal qualification – and the designation of laboratories as “executioners”.
Online courses, evening courses, workshops: develop your skills
Discover
Throughout the trial, Servier admitted having committed “a risk assessment error” related to the Mediator, but denies any “concealment” and all “intentional element”necessary to characterize deception. “There has never been an awareness of exposing patients to risk”assured Wednesday Etienne Kowalski, another lawyer of the group.
According to him, given the scientific knowledge of the time, “The risk-benefit balance of Mediator remained favorable until 2009, and keeping it on the market was justified”. As for the precautionary principle invoked by the public prosecutor, it “has not yet known consecration in criminal law”underlined Mr.e Kowalski, believing that an offense could not be based on a “hypothetical risk”. The defense also requested confirmation of the acquittal for fraud.
Health insurance, other small social security funds and several mutuals are claiming nearly 570 million euros from Servier, estimating that they have reimbursed millions of boxes of Mediator on the basis of “fraudulent maneuvers”.
But for the defence, Servier cannot be held responsible for damage to these organizations, because the decision to reimburse a drug depends on a ministerial order. However, the health authorities had as much, if not “more information than the people I represent today”assured M.e From Castro.
In his argument, the lawyer also worked to rehabilitate the founder of the laboratories, Jacques Servier, who died in 2014, claiming that he was not “not a money man”while the prosecution and the civil parties explain the maintenance of the Mediator on the market by ” the bait of gain “. At the same time, he asserted that Servier had no “most common” with the era of Jacques Servier, deploring the “demonization” suffered, according to him, by the group.