A controversial personality of the epidemic on the departure.
Professor Didier Raoult, founder of the IHU Méditerranée and specialist in infectious diseases, will have to leave his post as university professor at the end of August because of his age.
A retirement which could also lead, according to information from Le Monde and La Provence published Wednesday evening, the end of his functions at the head of the Marseille institute, which has become the echo chamber of many contested positions of the microbiologist.
Why did Didier Raoult lose his teaching duties?
At 69 years old, Didier Raoult has reached the age limit to be able to work as an academic, according to the rules set by the Ministry of Higher Education.
From the month of September, the professor will therefore have to retire, and leave his duties as university professor-hospital practitioner at Aix-Marseille University and Marseille University Hospitals.
What about the management of the IHU?
Due to his retirement, two members of the board of directors of the Institut hospitalo-universitaire (IHU) Méditerranée intend to propose to the board to launch a call for tenders to replace Didier Raoult at the head of the institute, according to Le Monde and La Provence. This call, distributed worldwide, will be used to recruit "a researcher, legitimate, charismatic and recognized by his peers in the field of infectious diseases", abounds Eric Berton, president of Aix-Marseille University. .
It is time to "turn a page and organize the future of the IHU for the next twenty years", explains François Crémieux, director general of Public Assistance-Hospitals of Marseille (AP-HM), to the World.
If this procedure goes as planned, the microbiologist could then leave the management of the IHU as early as 2022.
What does Didier Raoult say about it?
For the moment, Didier Raoult has not publicly expressed himself on the subject.
He had asked the AP-HM to extend its activities for three years, using a combined employment-retirement contract.
This request was refused by the public assistance, which judges "that there are largely the teams necessary for the IHU so that his departure is filled", according to the professor Jean-Luc Jouve, president of the medical commission of establishment (CME), cited in Le Monde.
Didier Raoult could however remain at the IHU by becoming a salaried director of the IHU foundation, which is private, specifies La Provence.
But it would be necessary to succeed in convincing the rest of the board of directors of the IHU, composed in particular of the founding members of the foundation, as well as "qualified personalities".
In this council, we find organizations that have already expressed their refusal, such as the AP-HM, Aix-Marseille University, the Research Institute for Development (IRD), and the French Blood Establishment, according to Provence.
There also sit, as “qualified personalities”, supporters of Didier Raoult, such as LR president of the Provence-Alpes-Côte-d'Azur region Renaud Muselier, or the former Minister of Health Philippe Douste-Blazy.
Why does this departure make people react?
Because this receding crumb has, in certain aspects, a political dimension. Since the spring of 2020, Didier Raoult has become a very popular figure in the circles of protesters and skeptics of the epidemic, or of the management of the epidemic. With its fierce defense of hydroxychloroquine as a treatment against Covid-19 (whose effectiveness has been denied), its minimization of the epidemic, or, more recently, its outings questioning the interest of vaccination or gravity of the Delta variant, the professor set himself up as "scientific guarantee of the anti-vaccine, anti-pass discourse", and "nourishes the conspiracy sphere", commented François Crémieux, of the AP-HM, to the World. His presence at the head of a recognized medical research institute then raises questions.
On social networks, the sympathizers of the doctor are furious since the announcement of his next departure in the press.
Since Wednesday evening, the hashtag #TouchePasARaoult has been one of the most used on Twitter in France, propelled in particular by Florian Philippot, leader of the Patriots and figure of the anti-health pass movement, or the lawyer Fabrice Di Vizio, another face of protest of the same movement.
#touchepasaraoult https://t.co/kxF3uJVBdG
- Fabrice Di Vizio (@ DIVIZIO1) August 18, 2021
“This bureaucratic desire to eliminate him is a shame and a scandal! All my support for the professor who is the victim of hatred and lobbies, ”also reacted the far-right MEP Gilbert Collard. At the IHU, researcher Eric Chabrière, loyal - and virulent - right-hand man of Didier Raoult, remains confident. "18 members make up the board of directors, and many of them are perfectly aware of the work carried out by the IHU under the direction of Didier Raoult," he says on Twitter.