France's election win for LEEM

The French drug industry association (LEEM) has succeeded in its objective of making the future of France's health care R&D a central point of the country's presidential elections, due on April 22 with a probable May 6 run-off (Marketletters passim). Such is the assessment of Pharmaceutiques, a French monthly trade publication, which reported that about 1,000 people attended the public debate organized by the LEEM at the Mutualite building in Paris on April 4.

Herve Karleskind said: "the publication of its 'manifesto' and the multiple interventions by its president Christian Lajoux had the resonance that the industry had sought after for a long time." Not only the size of the audience, but the caliber of the panellists, were a testimony to the achievements of the LEEM in this election campaign, Mr Karleskind added. An opinion poll published by the Ifop last month found that 85% of French voters consider it a "national priority" that France should be one of the major locations for pharmaceutical R&D. With this evidence of public credibility, the LEEM had organized a forum at the Paris headquarters of the mutual insurance funds and also a favorite venue for major political rallys.

Three of the four leading candidates were represented: Nicolas Sarkozy, the front-runner in the polls as the Marketletter was going to press, of the governing party, the conservative Union for a Popular Majority (UMP); Segolene Royal, the Socialist party (PS) candidate; and Francois Bayrou, the center-right French Democratic Union (UDF) candidate. Not represented was Jean-Marie Le Pen's anti-immigrant National Front (FN), although the extreme right-wing candidate came second in 2002 at the last presidential election, defeating the PS candidate to a run-off ballot. Not surprisingly, none of the political parties present disagreed with the objective of "making France a great life sciences nation." A consensus was also found around the recognition that there has been a "collapse" in the social funding system of health care and that public funds were lacking to promote pharmaceutical or other health-related R&D. Among the issues raised in the discussion were the failings of fundamental research in France.