After three doctors (Agnès Buzyn, Olivier Véran, François Braun), a medical secretary (Brigitte Bourguignon), a former history teacher (Aurélien Rousseau), and a pharmacist (Agnès Firmin-le-Bodo), the executive chose this this time to put a former journalist at the head of the Ministry of Health.
Frédéric Valletoux, appointed Minister of Health, began his career at
La Gazette des communes
before working for ten years at the daily
Les Échos
.
But these journalistic beginnings seem a long way away, because at 57 years old, Frédéric Valletoux has had several careers which have made him a seasoned politician with solid experience as a local elected official, but also a fine connoisseur of the health system.
Many strings to his bow which convinced the executive.
Under the label UMP then LR, this son of a former vice-president of the Dexia bank - the bank which had sold thousands of so-called "toxic" loans to hospitals - was mayor of Fontainebleau continuously for ten years. seven years (2005-2022) and regional councilor of Île-de-France for thirteen years.
Close to Valérie Pécresse, he however left LR in 2016 denouncing a hardening of the party, to gradually move closer to the presidential majority until joining Agir (the party of Franck Riester) in 2019, then the new Horizons party of Édouard Philippe in 2021. After a career largely on the right, he joined the presidential majority, becoming Horizons deputy and spokesperson for the group in 2022.
Read alsoBayrou refuses to join the government and denounces the Macron-Attal line
Frédéric Valletoux, who has real convictions about the necessary transformation of the health system, hoped for this appointment while remaining cautious, scalded by the last reshuffle in July.
Already expected at the time to take the reins of the ministry, he was even contacted by the Élysée… before being supplanted at the last moment by Aurélien Rousseau.
In the shadows, François Bayrou opposed his nomination because it would have given two deputies to Édouard Philippe's Horizons party - the other then being Christophe Béchu appointed to the Ecological Transition -, while his own party, the Modem, had only one full minister in the person of Marc Fesneau for agriculture.
The winds have changed.
Read alsoMedical deserts: Valletoux “does not wish” to affect doctors’ freedom of installation
Although he is not a caregiver, Frédéric Valletoux also knows the health system very well, of which he has mastered all the mysteries, having chaired the French Hospital Federation (FHF) for more than ten years from 2011 to 2022. A long immersion in the daily life of public hospitals and nursing homes, during which he formed solid convictions on the reforms to be carried out.
He has been advocating for years to eliminate the 30% of redundant procedures or to involve city doctors in ongoing care.
His positions have not only made him friends.
Liberal doctors see this “
hospitalist
” as a scarecrow and have long warned that “
his appointment would be seen as a provocation
”.
It must be said that his bill on access to care, passed on December 18, ignited the powder before being emptied in the Senate of its most irritating articles.
Seeing in this text a sum of coercive measures and bureaucratic constraints - return of compulsory guards, obligation to join the professional territorial health communities (CPTS) etc.
-, the doctors' unions proclaimed a general strike on October 13, against the backdrop of conventional negotiations with a view to a price increase.
Read alsoMedical deserts: doctors refuse to take the blame
However, this father of five children, passionate about politics, health issues and his city of Fontainebleau, is naturally cheerful and friendly.
A former journalist, he knows how to popularize complex subjects and is a very good communicator.
Without being a “techno”, he has a perfect understanding of the challenges of the healthcare system.
A local elected official, he is well aware of land use planning constraints and the problem of medical deserts.
An alchemy which will not be too much to respond to the immense challenges facing the world of health, faced with the shortage of doctors, the emergency crisis, the hospital deficit, the soaring Social Security gap or even the lack of recognition of community medicine…
Also read: Frédéric Valletoux: “I call for sacred union, the private sector must take its part alongside the public”
On the front line during the Covid crisis, Frédéric Valletoux successfully called for “
the sacred union of the public and the private
” to organize the response to the epidemic.
Faced with an unprecedented wave of resignations from caregivers at the end of the epidemic, he was able to defend the interests of public establishments and their staff by negotiating significant salary increases with the government during the “Ségur de la santé”.
“
We are on the eve of a historic moment for our health system: either that of recovery or that of collapse.
After years of patching up and half-measures, the time for boldness has come to save a very sick health system
,” he already warned in 2022, at the time of the presidential election.