The treasure hunt. For several months, many French people have been forced to go around pharmacies, looking for the last boxes of drugs available, while more and more references are approaching the shortage in France. The situation worries more and more patients or their relatives, who are afraid of no longer being able to treat themselves properly.
Guest of BFMTV and RMC this Monday, April 3, the Minister of Health François Braun returned to this situation, explaining: “There are no drugs in absolute rupture, but in tension”. In detail, this means that there is no total shortage of stock in the country, but that some pharmacies are experiencing delivery delays. According to the National Medicines Safety Agency, here are the ones that are hard to find right now.
This long list could grow even longer in the coming weeks, if the situation persists. This is what the government intends to avoid, when the tension is already at its highest among the French, between the difficulties linked to inflation and the anger against the pension reform. Here is what Emmanuel Macron and the government have planned.
“We have a real problem with all the drugs, but there is no shortage,” said François Braun on BFMTV. “Never again, we still have to put in place what is necessary: it’s a big plan on drug shortages that is being put in place,” he adds to the news channel.
The first stage of the plan mentioned by the Minister of Health consists in drawing up a list of the medicines which the French need the most: “We must determine which are the essential medicines, the critical medicines, those which no one can do without”. A list which will be finalized in May, according to the minister, “with all the medical specialties”. François Braun takes the example of the United States, which has drawn up a list of 173 references. Will this first step allow the situation to improve quickly?
Once the development of this list is complete, the government will have to determine “all the points of manufacture of the drug, from the active ingredient to the tablet or bottle”, explains BFMTV. The goal? Better control the entire production chain and “ensure that these essential drugs will always be available”.
Last point of work, France’s dependence on foreign countries in the medical field. On this subject, François Braun explained to BFMTV wanting to “repatriate the active ingredients of these essential drugs with France and the EU”.
