Agnès Buzyn appointed as French Minister of Health

Today, Agnès Buzyn has been appointed French Minister of Social Affairs and Health serving under the new Macron Presidency. Mrs. Buzyn, who replaces Marisol Touraine serving under the former Hollande Presidency, is a reputed haematologist and held numerous positions in scholarly societies and state agencies with a medical and public health mission.
Most recently, Mrs. Buzyn served as President of the Collège of the French High Health Authority (HAS) from March 2016 until her ministerial appointment (her executive responsibilities having been delegated to HAS Director Dominique Maigne). She held numerous academic positions and took part in many scholarly societies and boards of directors, in particular, as member of the scientific councils of the Biomedicine Agency (ABM) (2005-2008) and the French Blood Establishment (EFS), and as President of the scientific council of the French Society of Marrow Transplantation and Cell Therapy (SFGM-TC) (2008-2011). In addition, Mrs. Buzyn served as chairman of the board of directors of the Institute for Radiation Protection and Nuclear Safety (IRSN) (2008 to 2013), member of the Atomic Energy Committee (2009 to 2015), and as President of the National Cancer Institute (INCa) (2011 to 2016).
Mrs. Buzyn is often lauded for her capacity to reach consensus, and is expected to put efforts in restating links with health care practitioners, deal with health inequalities, and increase the participation of patients in a health care setting. In the past, Mrs. Buzyn has questioned the adequacy of further strengthening the rules governing conflicts of interest between health care professionals and the pharmaceutical industry.

This post was originally co-authored by Patricia Carmona Botana.