On the occasion of the presentation of its annual report, April 11, the Department of Economy, employment, work and solidarity (DEETS) gave some details on the Reunion side of the “Urgo affair”.
The manufacturer of dressings and compresses was very generous, between 2015 and 2021, to thousands of pharmacists, who were offered gifts (watches, champagne bottles, voyages…) in exchange for waiving commercial discounts on certain products. The amount of these “small gestures” had reached 55 million euros. 120 pharmacists in Reunion are affected by this fraudulent system which has harmed Health Insurance, having to reimburse more practitioners who had waived discounts. Since last year, agents from the DEETS competition department carry out criminal hearings with the pharmacists concerned, under the authority of the Saint-Denis and Saint-Pierre public prosecutors who will decide what action to take.
