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Dr Gérald Kierzek (Medical Director)
Since Saturday evening, the new members of the government led by Michel Barnier have been known. The French have discovered Geneviève Darrieussecq as Minister of Health and Access to Care. Here is her portrait and the policy she intends to defend.
At 68, Geneviève Darrieussecq becomes the new Minister of Health and Access to Healthcare. A doctor by training and a discreet figure in the government since 2017, she inherits a sensitive portfolio, with urgent issues to deal with: improving access to healthcare, reforming public health services, and managing the Social Security deficit. Faced with high expectations, she has already announced that miracles will not be forthcoming.
The sixth Minister of Health since 2022
Geneviève Darrieussecq, a 68-year-old allergist, has just been elected Minister of Health and Access to Care. Discreet, she has hardly left the government since 2017 and Emmanuel Macron’s accession to power. Geneviève Darrieussecq has in fact held the positions of Secretary of State to the Minister of the Armed Forces, Minister Delegate for Remembrance and Veterans, and Minister Delegate for Disabled People.
With this experience, the centrist MP from Landes was therefore offered the position of Minister of Health and Access to Care. But she warns from the outset that she will not “work miracles”.I am not a fairy“we can hear her say yesterday, Monday September 23, when she spoke about the 2025 Social Security budget. The envelopes”will increase a little” she promises, but “never live up to what everyone would hope for“.
The hot issues awaiting the minister
Geneviève Darrieussecq wants to first work on access to care. To improve, the health system must “certainly break down barriers“she explains”Each person should not consider the other as a competitor but as a fellow traveler.“She also wants to tackle the “demographic challenge” and work on prevention in terms of health.
According to Dr. Gérald Kierzek, emergency physician and medical director of Doctissimo, several other burning issues await the new minister.
- “Improving the functioning of public health services, a priority put forward by Prime Minister Michel Barnier;
- Responding to French people’s concerns about the difficulty of obtaining medical appointments (medical deserts), recurring problems in hospitals (emergency rooms, psychiatry, etc.) and in community medicine (will the €30 consultation with general practitioners be enough?);
- The rapid preparation of the Social Security budget, which has been delayed due to the change of government, with a Social Security deficit expected to exceed 16 billion euros this year;
- Handling the sensitive issue of the soaring cost of compensation for work stoppages;
- The management of the potentially explosive issue of the questioning of State Medical Aid, a subject demanded by the right during the debates on the immigration law;
- And finally, also come back to the law concerning the end of lifewhile the examination of the bill was interrupted by the dissolution decided by the President of the Republic Emmanuel Macron“.
Recreate a territorial network and restore governance to caregivers
For Gérald Kierzek, the new minister inherits “years or even decades of mismanagement with money scattered around and decisions made by a bloated technostructure (ARS, hospital management, etc.)”.
According to the emergency doctor,reforms must be structural to recreate a territorial network, with the cessation of closures of local establishments, the creation of beds…“.
Not to mention the fact that “remotivate healthcare professionals, in particular by entrusting them with part of the governance” he concluded.