Elderly people left without care for several days, limited food, insufficient diapers… Last week, the book by journalist Victor Castanet, The Gravediggers, has brought to light the overwhelming practices common in the nursing homes of Orpéa, intended to improve the profitability of its retirement homes which nevertheless charge the stays of their residents at a high price.
Since the release of the investigation and its startling revelations, the private group which manages hundreds of retirement homes in France and in around twenty other countries has been in turmoil.
The management of Orpea summoned by the government
The Minister Delegate for the Autonomy of the Elderly, Brigitte Bourguignon, summoned the Director General of Orpea, Jean-Christophe Romersi, on February 1 to “respond” to the “serious accusations” concerning the group’s practices in its Ehpad. This interview “will be an opportunity to hear the explanations of the Orpea group on several points which will be the subject of in-depth investigations by the State services”, she specifies in this letter.
The Minister wishes to have details on “the allocation to establishments of consumables such as sanitary protection or on issues related to the nutrition of residents”, “the group’s managerial practices concerning staff, the rate of supervision”, ” the procedures for reporting and following up on acts of mistreatment reported by relatives of residents” as well as “the group’s financial practices”.
The convocation will take place Tuesday morning, from 9:15 am.
Legal action soon launched by families of residents
In addition to the government seeking to find out more about acts of abuse in nursing homes at Orpea, families of residents are preparing to launch collective legal action against the manager of retirement homes. According to information from Le Parisien, lawyer Sarah Saldmann should file a group action before the Paris public prosecutor by March. The latter will include multiple complaints from families of residents of Ehpad Orpea
In France, complaints are scattered, which gives Orpea a feeling of omnipotence. Several victims have turned to me to initiate a joint class action against this group for negligent violence, endangering the lives of others and manslaughter.
Sarah Saldmann, lawyer, at Parisian
Many complaints are similar, underlines the newspaper. These are often the daughters of residents who have placed their parent in one of the group’s nursing homes. A few months later, their mothers or fathers were hospitalized, victims in particular of fractures, raising suspicions of abuse.
An investigation carried out by the ARS in a nursing home implicated
The regional health agency of Île-de-France also carried out an inspection in the Ehpad of the Orpea group in Neuilly-sur-Seine whose practices were denounced in the book The Gravediggers. This ARS inspection first took place “for several hours” on Thursday and Friday. It takes a few days to know the results.
According to a source familiar with the matter, this inspection is carried out jointly with the departmental council of Hauts-de-Seine, which participates in the financing of the dependency component of nursing homes.
In this same nursing home in Neuilly-sur-Seine, a preliminary investigation was opened in 2020 following a complaint for acts of manslaughter concerning a resident, the Nanterre prosecutor’s office told AFP. “We are not aware of such a complaint,” reacted Monday evening Orpea, questioned by AFP.
A sacked general manager
Latest twist in this terrible affair: the dismissal of the CEO of Orpea, Yves Le Masne, who was dismissed from his post on Sunday. He should still go to the convocation, Tuesday, of the leaders of Orpéa by Brigitte Bourguignon.
Non-executive Chairman of the Group’s Board of Directors since March 2017, Philippe Charrier has become “Chairman and Chief Executive Officer of the company with immediate effect”. His “mission will be to ensure, under the supervision of the Board, that best practices are applied throughout the company and to shed full light on the allegations made, relying in particular on the assessment missions entrusted by the Board of Directors to two independent firms in the process of being appointed”, announced Orpéa.
1156: this is the number of establishments that Orpea manages in 23 countries. The group has a total of 116,514 beds.
Candidates for the presidential election who castigate Orpea
After the shocking revelations of Gravediggers, a change in management will not be enough to reassure the families of the thousands of residents of Ehpad Orpea. The publication of the book has prompted widespread outrage from union and political leaders, who are calling for sweeping changes in the oversight and management of private care homes.
In the National Assembly, the Socialist deputies notably asked that parliamentarians be able to have a right of visit in Ehpad on the model of what is practiced for places of deprivation of liberty. “These visits can get things moving. In the event of malfunctions, private groups risk “name and shame” and this can have a beneficial effect on the care of residents, ”explained Socialist MP Christine Pires Beaune. On the right, the boss of Les Républicains deputies Damien Abad has asked for the implementation of the Estates General of Dependency.
A few weeks before the first round of the presidential election, many candidates, right and left, were moved by the revelations of abuse linked to Orpea. The opportunity for several contenders for the Elysée to attack private groups making profits on the addiction of the elderly.
Yannick Jadot, environmental candidate, thus proposes to “get out of a system where our elders have become speculative products”, and asks for more checks in nursing homes and a minimum number of caregivers per establishment.
Jean-Luc Mélenchon wants to “build a public dependency service, to help seniors stay at home” by creating more than 200,000 jobs whose salaries would be increased. The candidate of the Insoumis also wishes to ban private and lucrative nursing homes. A position close to that of the communist candidate Fabien Roussel, who wants to put private groups under supervision and open 300,000 new positions in nursing homes.
As for Valérie Pécresse, candidate of the Republicans, she wishes to bet on home help by developing “home services throughout the territory to allow the elderly to live at home”
Emmanuel Macron had promised in 2018 a law on the dependency of the elderly, before this project was put back in the boxes. Measures for old age have been voted as part of the 2022 Social Security budget.