Acting Minister of Health Agnès Firmin Le Bodo confirmed on Friday that she was the subject of an investigation linked to her profession as a pharmacist, after an article in Mediapart indicating that she had received gifts worth 20,000 euros from Urgo laboratories.
“As part of my role as pharmacist, an investigation is underway. Allow me to reserve the discussions that I should have with the competent authorities,” declared Ms. Firmin Le Bodo to France Bleu Normandie, without wanting to say more about the subject.
20,000 euros in gifts
The previous evening, the Le Havre public prosecutor Bruno Dieudonné confirmed to AFP that an investigation had been opened “on the grounds of unauthorized perception by a health professional of advantages provided by a person producing or marketing sanitary products+, as a continuation of the case which resulted in the conviction of Urgo laboratories in January 2023 by the Dijon criminal court”, without giving the identity of the people involved.
This statement followed an article in the online newspaper Mediapart indicating that Ms. Firmi Le Bodo had received “without declaring them” gifts with an estimated total value of 20,000 euros, from 2015 to 2020, from the Urgo group.
Pharmacist by profession, Ms. Firmin Le Bodo, who runs a pharmacy in Le Havre (Seine-Maritime), “is suspected of having had luxury products delivered to her on 21 occasions, from 2015 to 2020 – watches, bottles of wine and magnums of champagne, boxes for weekends… – for a total amount estimated at 20,000 euros, from Urgo laboratories”, detailed Mediapart. “Urgo thus sought to retain pharmacists and increase their commercial margins,” continues the media.
Urgo laboratories already condemned for offering gifts to pharmacists
In January 2023, Urgo laboratories were fined 1,125,000 euros, including 625,000 suspended, for having offered gifts to pharmacists, in return for giving up commercial discounts, a practice strictly prohibited.
Agnès Firmin Le Bodo, until then deputy minister responsible for territorial organization and health professions, was named interim Minister of Health on Wednesday after the resignation of Aurélien Rousseau for disagreement on the immigration law.