Pharma giant Servier found guilty of manslaughter over deadly weight loss pill

The Servier pharmaceutical group was found guilty by a Paris court on Monday, as the trial over one of the biggest health scandals to have hit France came to a close.

More than ten years after the opening of a judicial investigation and eighteen months after the start of the trial, the drugmaker was found guilty of involuntary manslaughter and aggravated fraud for selling the weight loss pill 'Mediator,' which was blamed for hundreds of deaths.

"It was a historic trial, it becomes for me, a historic judgment. Even if it is not entirely satisfactory, it is nonetheless true that this is the first time that a laboratory has been so severely condemned," said victims' lawyer Jean-Christophe Coubris. "I hope that the laboratories will hear both the suffering of the victims and the condemnation that has been pronounced against the Servier laboratories," the lawyer added.

"Servier laboratories are ordered to pay the victims around 160 million euros (188 million USD). This is extremely low compared to the real profit made by the Mediator, around 400 million euros (470,9 million USD) during the 14 years of undue marketing," said Charles-Joseph-Oudin, lawyer of Michel Due, one of the victims.

Servier was also sentenced to a fine of 2.7 million euros (3,18 million USD).

Jean-Philippe Seta executive of Servier pharmaceutical group was sentenced to four years of suspended imprisonment, as well as a fine of 90,600 euros (106,67 USD).

At least 500 people died of heart valve problems due to the Mediator's active ingredient, according to France's health ministry. The drug was on the market for 33 years before it was pulled in 2009.

Credit: Ruptly

#pharma #servier #mediator