Medicines: “No complete break” despite a “worrying” situation, for Philippe Besset


Since December, finding certain drugs in French pharmacies has become very complicated. Amoxicillin, an antibiotic for children, and paracetamol are among the substances in short supply. Invited this morning to the microphone of Europe 1, Philippe Besset, president of the Federation of Pharmaceutical Unions of France (FSPF), returned to these difficulties. According to the pharmacist, if “amoxicillin and paracetamol are still under very strong tension, we still have solutions between us to find some. There is not a complete break in the territory of these products”.

“We have been saying for years that we will go into the wall if we continue to export our factories”

For him, it is therefore not necessary to hesitate to go to his pharmacist. “Go to your pharmacist, there may be a little delay, but we will find solutions”, he insists, even if the lack of amoxicillin and paracetamol is felt, especially in hospitals, such as in Lille or Marseilles.

“This case is very worrying. We have been alerting for years, saying that we are going to hit the wall if we continue to export our factories and trust only Asian countries to supply us”, insists the pharmacist at the microphone of Europe 1. Even if, according to him, “there is beginning to be an awareness, factories are beginning to be created. The movement should therefore be reversed in the years to come but it will be long”, advances Philippe Besset.

Pharmacies are manufacturing their drugs again

In the meantime, some French pharmacies have started to manufacture amoxicillin again. “We mobilized about fifty pharmacies in France. It should be remembered that in the 19th century and at the beginning of the 20th century, it was pharmacies that manufactured drugs. Some of us have kept this know-how and therefore are able to react very quickly to produce any medicine. And they do it on behalf of the colleagues. I myself have a pharmacist colleague who makes preparations when I ask him to, “he explains. .

Emergency solutions, which should therefore make it possible to avoid a total shortage of these drugs, according to Philippe Besset. Even if other problems are added to these supply difficulties, such as the traffic of Paxlovid, this drug used against Covid, to China.



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