Prevention of conflicts of interest in the field of health expertise

On 23 March 2016, the Court of Auditors published a report on the prevention of conflicts of interest in the field of health expertise, requested by the Senate’s Social Affairs Committee, which provides an initial assessment of the law of 29 December 2011 in this field. Despite its ambition, the transparency system introduced by this text presents major flaws (lack of control of declared information, criminal sanctions with no real scope, very restrictive interpretation of the benefits granted by manufacturers to healthcare professionals). The verification of its implementation in five organisations (HAS, ANSM, INCa, CEPS, Oniam) highlights frequent anomalies, be it compliance with reporting obligations, analysis of relationships of interest and methods of management of conflicts of interest, the advertising of sessions or the financial content of agreements with health professionals, on which a first light is provided. This assessment calls, in addition to the law of 26 January 2016, for measures to better organise the central administration and health agencies, support the independence and quality of health expertise, strengthen the effectiveness of the system of declarations of interest and establish effective control of their veracity by an independent body. The Court makes ten recommendations to that effect. This report is available on [the Court’s website] (https://www.ccomptes.fr/fr/publications/la-prevention-des-conflits-dinterets-en-matiere-dexpertise-sanitaire). The published files correspond to the data used in the preparation of the report.