the new director of the establishment suspends clinical trials

End clap for the controversial tests in Marseille. Professor Fournier, who has just succeeded the controversial Didier Raoult at the head of the IHU Méditerranée Infection, announced on Wednesday September 7 the suspension of clinical trials in the establishment, after a damning new report and while the justice system is investigating the institute practices.

“I have ensured that all ongoing clinical trials relating to research involving the human person (RIPH) are suspended, pending the regularization of the situation”writes Pierre-Edouard Fournier in a statement sent to AFP. Professor Fournier, a specialist in infectious diseases and whose appointment had given rise to reservations because he himself worked for a long time under the aegis of the teacher Raoult, took office in the midst of a media storm around the institute.

In this first official speech, he opted for a conciliatory tone which contrasts with that of his predecessor, ensuring for example that his first meetings with Marseille hospitals (AP-HM) “have made it possible to lay the foundations for constructive and peaceful relations”.

It is also said “happy” to meet shortly with the Ministers of Health and Research to present to them its “ambitious action plan” who “will implement the recommendations” of the report of the General Inspectorate of Social Affairs (Igas) and its counterpart for higher education and research (IGESR) published on Monday. This document underlined the medical, scientific and management deviations within the IHU, several of which could “to fall under a criminal qualification”. The Ministers of Research and Health, Sylvie Retailleau and François Braun, announced in the wake of taking legal action.

The Marseille prosecutor’s office announced that it had already opened a judicial investigation in July, after another scathing report from the National Medicines Safety Agency (ANSM).