Largely driven by community pharmacy footfall, France’s self-care market is dynamic and characterized by high levels of innovation, according to French self-care industry association, NèreS. As NèreS’ executive director Luc Besançon explains in this episode of HBW Insight’s Over the Counter podcast, much of this is down to the tireless work of the association. Renaming self-care products as first-line or “premier recours” (first-line) products, identifying medicines that are available OTC in other countries that could be switched in France and quantifying the impact that the revised Urban Wastewater Treatment Directive would have on access to medicines are all strands of NèreS’ pathbreaking recent work.

Timestamps

2:20 – Introductions

3:00 – France’s self-care market

7:50 – Innovation in supplements and devices

11:00 – “Premiere recourse” products

13:00 – Driving reclassification

18:00 – Harmonising Rx-to-OTC switch across Europe

20:00 – Switch environment in France

26:00 – Impact of Urban Wastewater Treatment Directive in France

33:00 – Who should pay?

37:00 – NèreS priorities for 2025