Up to 1.7 billion euros of unused medicines each year

To date, "the methods of collecting and processing unused medicines do not allow us to know precisely the amounts and nature of expenditure on medicines that could have been avoided," the Court of Auditors emphasizes.

Its cost assessment was carried out based on the quantities of unused medicines collected by the Cyclamed organization responsible for their recovery.

The bill reaches up to 1.7 billion euros if the calculation takes into account all medicines, but it falls to around 561 to 788 million euros if the most expensive ones are excluded, the Court of Auditors explains.

The volume of medicines discarded and collected by Cyclamed represented 8,503 tonnes in 2023.

The potential for reducing this waste can be estimated at between 224 million and 867 million euros, according to the investigation conducted by the Court of Auditors.

"It is essential that public authorities improve their knowledge of the use of health products, prescribed, dispensed and reimbursed, and understand why some of them are not used," writes the public finance watchdog.

She recommends relying on Cyclamed's expertise to quantify unused medicines, assess the proportion of expired medicines, identify the most wasted products and determine the reasons for this in order to "incite preventive measures".

Redistribution of unused drugs could be, she said, "a promising measure," particularly for expensive or highly prescribed drugs.

Similarly, certain medical devices (crutches, wheelchairs, walking frames, etc.) could be reused, refurbished or recycled to recover at least their components, the report recommends.

Among its other recommendations for better use of health products (medicines and medical devices), the Court of Auditors proposes encouraging manufacturers to adapt packaging and expiry dates.

Health products represented a cost of 36.05 billion euros for health insurance in 2023, including 25.26 billion for medicines and 10.79 billion for medical devices.

The government is aiming to reduce health spending by around five billion euros next year.