Newly appointed French interim Health Minister Agnès Firmin Le Bodo confirmed on Friday that the judiciary has opened an investigation against her. These are luxury gifts from a pharmaceutical company.
Accordingly, the politician is said to have accepted champagne and luxury watches worth 20,000 euros from a pharmaceutical company during her time as a pharmacist and did not declare them. “The investigation concerns my time as a pharmacist,” Firmin Le Bodo told broadcaster France Bleu Normandie, without providing further details on the cause.
Received luxury gifts more than 20 times
The research medium ‘Mediapart’ previously reported that Le Bodo received luxury gifts no fewer than twenty times between 2015 and 2020, including magnum bottles of champagne and vouchers for weekend trips. In this way, the “Urgo” laboratory wanted to retain pharmacies as customers and increase profits,” wrote “Mediapart”.
In January, the Urgo laboratory in Dijon was fined more than a million euros for giving gifts to pharmacists to get them to forego discounts – a strictly prohibited practice.
Minister received the most expensive gifts
According to the investigation by “Mediapart”, the judiciary subsequently dealt with the recipients of the gifts. The current Minister of Health is said to have been one of the recipients who received the most expensive gifts in total.
The previous Health Minister Aurélien Rousseau resigned in protest against the highly controversial immigration law passed this week, which has parallels with the program of right-wing populists.
Source: Krone

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