The former Minister of Health, Olivier Véran, a neurologist by training, will turn to aesthetic medicine, which he will practice one day a week, he said on Tuesday, March 19, to Agence France- Press (AFP), confirming information from the daily Le Figaro.

Mr. Véran, who resumed his mandate as a deputy after leaving the government, will practice at the Champs-Elysées clinic, and has enrolled at the faculty of Créteil for training. “It seemed extremely complicated to me to return to neurology at the University Hospital, on the one hand because the discipline has evolved very strongly on a therapeutic level (…), and [on] two [because] I very quickly realized account in particular by discussing with some patients that the label of minister that I have on my forehead disrupted the therapeutic relationship” with them, he told AFP.

According to Mr. Véran, “15% of the French adult population uses aesthetic medicine treatments, and this is something that should not be denigrated.” “There is still a very significant percentage of French people who suffer”, whether due to a “scar on the face”, “accelerated aging linked to menopause” or “premature baldness” , he illustrates.

“What a disastrous message.”

The deputy for Isère, who sits on the Renaissance group, also confides in joining two associations on a voluntary basis, “one which allows self-defense for women [Ladies System Defense] and another RoseUp which supports women who had breast cancer (…) in post-cancer rehabilitation”. But he “remains a deputy” and is far “from having left politics”, he assures. He is therefore thinking about “making a sort of backpacker’s guide to RN cities”, after having visited several cities where the extreme right is very strong or which are led by its representatives. “We must re-explain the program, the ideas, the danger represented by the extreme right,” he says.

The announcement of this reconversion caused the medical community to react. “When you are a neurologist, when there is a shortage of neurologists (…), when you know the health crisis that we are experiencing, with patients who take months to get appointments, that these things are the consequences policies that Mr. Véran has pursued, we still have the courage to stay in our profession,” criticized, on RMC, the president of the UFML doctors’ union, Jérôme Marty.

“Obviously, it’s not about making money. Without doubt Olivier Véran will go to practice this profession at the hospital and will benefit the poor by working in sector 1 [without excess fees] or by being an employee,” quipped the trade unionist.

“Outrageous! », Also reacted, on X, the spokesperson for the association of emergency doctors in France, Christophe Prudhomme. “Rather than training in aesthetic medicine, [Olivier] Véran could have used the same time to refresh his skills in his specialty.” For the doctor and socialist senator Bernard Jomier, “a former minister can no longer be totally free in his choices. Moving from neurology to aesthetic medicine makes sense, that of a financial choice. What a disastrous message,” he wrote, on X.