Investigation opened on the financial management of Cosem health centres

An investigation has been opened to shed light on the financial management of Cosem, an association of fifteen health centers and financed by public funds, said Tuesday the Paris prosecutor's office, joined by AFP. The investigations, revealed by Radio France, were entrusted to the Brigade for the repression of economic crime (BRDE), confirmed the prosecutor's office.

In April, two reports were sent to the courts. A first on April 7 by the primary health insurance fund (CPAM) of Paris, which indicated that it had been alerted to a "suspicion for fraud". Another on April 17 by elected officials of the social and economic committee (CSE) of Cosem who denounced facts that could be qualified as breach of trust, illegal taking of interest, fraud to the Social Security and moral harassment, according to their lawyer Me Jérôme Karsenti.

"As a lawyer for whistleblowers, I am pleased that the prosecutor's office has opened a preliminary investigation," Karsenti told AFP on Tuesday. "I hope for the employees that this investigation will be quick so that these Cosem health centers, with a long history, can be saved from the prevaricative practices of their leaders," he charged. Asked by AFP after the issuance of these reports, the management had refused to comment, ensuring that Cosem "has always complied with all its legal and regulatory obligations".

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Cosem "provides quality care to the poorest under the permanent control of its supervisory authorities," she insisted. The non-profit health association Coordination des oeuvres sociales et médicales (Cosem), which employs 1,400 people, is financed by public funds - reimbursements from social security and subsidies. This structure is managed by a father, managing director since 2010, and his two sons. "We are facing a family that has totally appropriated the walls and created satellite companies" that draw on the finances of Cosem, said in April to AFP an elected representative of the CSE on condition of anonymity.

The elected representatives of the CSE suspect the family of impoverishing Cosem "in order to serve their private interests" and fear consequences on jobs. They denounce exorbitant salaries paid to the father and his sons, fictitious jobs of their wives and disproportionate expense reports - more than 285,000 euros for three people in 2021. The Cosem, created in 1945, claims two million medical and dental consultations per year provided by 700 practitioners in fifteen centers in Île-de-France and in the provinces, according to its website.