One minister ousts another. After five months in office, Frédéric Valletoux, Minister of Health, will give way, on Avenue de Ségur, to Geneviève Darrieussecq. Mr. Valletoux was Minister Delegate, under the supervision of Catherine Vautrin (Minister of Labour, Health and Solidarity); Mrs. Darrieussecq will be a full minister, a “sign” which health workers have been demanding since the resignation of the previous government was announced.
The 68-year-old MoDem MP is no stranger to the ministry, having been the ministerial delegate responsible for people with disabilities in 2022-2023. A mandate during which she was particularly involved in the preparation of the Paralympic Games. Previously, she was twice Secretary of State at the Ministry of the Armed Forces, first in charge of the army’s health service (2017-2020), then of memory and veterans (2020-2022). That is to say, three ministerial posts under the governments of Edouard Philippe, Jean Castex and Elisabeth Borne, since the beginning of the Macron presidency.
Originally from the Landes, she worked as an allergist before joining the UDF, then the MoDem, and entering politics, becoming a regional councillor for Aquitaine in 2004. Elected mayor of Mont-de-Marsan in 2008, she then established herself on the inter-communal, regional and then departmental councils, before winning a seat as a Landes deputy in 2017, and being re-elected there ever since.
We will remember the passage. Mr Valletoux’s tenure at the Ministry of Health – five months – the signing of the “medical agreement” with the representatives of liberal medicine, a second successful attempt after the failure of the first negotiations, in 2023, although this thorny project had been launched by his predecessors. Another highlight for the resigning minister: the recent confrontation with private clinics, at a time of extreme budgetary tensions and unprecedented hospital deficits. After having established, in March 2024, higher hospital rates for public hospitals than for private ones, provoking the anger of the latter and their calling for a strike, Mr Valletoux clarified the situation by granting a certain number of financial measures, not quantified. It is up to his successor, Ms Darrieussecq, to maintain them.
