In 2009 The French Minister of Health reacted extremely strongly to H1N1 Flu. Huge orders of vaccines. Stockpiling of nearly 2 billion masks.
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Fewer than 400 French died. Most of the €600m stock was destroyed as it went out of date. She was accused of waste and scaremongering.

You'd need a @lemondefr subscription to read it. But this 2000 word piece is a strong antidote to the many Captain Hindsight takes. https://www.lemonde.fr/politique/article/2020/03/26/roselyne-bachelot-la-rehabilitation_6034573_823448.html

There's an excellent archive of political cartoons mocking her here. She was a fat idiot, she was exaggerating to give money to big business, or as a cover to supress civil liberties. http://www.leplacide.com/dossier-Roselyne-Bachelot-estime-la-facture-de-la-grippe-porcine-%C3%A0-1,5-milliards-deuros-7177-1-84.html

Here's clips from the inquiry into her failings and waste. https://twitter.com/JL7508/status/1241341192278888454?s=20

She says (I translate with some freedom) "The backlash against me changed our political culture. People started to say that the government is exaggerating, it should step back. And so now, for us politicians, the risk of doing too much has become greater than not doing enough."

There are many long-lasting effects of this. France remains (though we'll if that's changed in the last month) one of the most anti-vaccine countries in Europe (though they still take them, despite thinking they're bad). Its anti-vaccine movement grew rapidly out of this story.

In 2016 the French government mostly got rid of the system of stockpiling and preparation for health disasters that she had boosted. It's a great piece.

Also some good context for those in the UK eager to jump to partisan takes on these issues -- the parties in power/opposition are the reverse of that in the UK, and the cuts to the size of the state that the UK saw in the 2010s did not happen in France.

My guess, just a guess, is that a very significant proportion of those who are now saying "it was obvious what to do and this awful government didn't do it" would have been in the "typical morons in government, massive waste, it was obvious what to do..." crowd back then.

And if they were Brits they quite probably supported the Iraq war right up until they had actually never ever supported the Iraq war.

Thanks @veza85UE for this link. Roselyne Bachelot absolutely fuming at the experts who attacked Macron for over-reacting in early March and then suddenly and shamelessly switched to attacking him for under-reacting by late March. https://www.dailymotion.com/video/x7sqe2x