Screening carried out in five communes of Gard affected by mining pollution reveals that residents have abnormal levels of heavy metals in their blood.
Contaminated. The inhabitants of the five municipalities located in the Cévennes have abnormal levels of heavy metals in the blood, once again confirmed by the analyzes carried out by the ARS (Regional Health Agency) of Languedoc-Roussillon.
These Gard communes (Saint-Sébastien-d’Aigrefeuille, Générargues, Saint-Félix-de-Pallières, Thoiras, Tornac) are located on the land of former mines. For decades, lead, arsenic, zinc and even cadmium were extracted there by an industrialist, Umicore, who did not take care to clean up the site after its departure in 1971. Three million tonnes of mining waste lies on the territory.
651 people tested
Almost half a century later, the inhabitants are paying a heavy price for this mining activity. The latest results of the ARS thus reveal that 13% of the residents detected show a cadmium impregnation higher than normal.
“The first results indicate that 22% of the participants in the study had an arsenic impregnation higher than the reference value established in the general population”, also specifies the ARS in a press release. The screening involved 651 people who volunteered “or 347 households, including 564 people over 15 and 87 children under 15”.
These results confirm previous analyzes carried out on 675 inhabitants in December 2015. Among them, 46 people had abnormally high levels of cadmium, lead and arsenic in the blood.
The relevance of the screening in question
The ARS adds in its press release that “no case of childhood lead poisoning has been detected. Only 3 cases of lead concentration in the blood greater than or equal to the vigilance threshold (25 micrograms per liter) were observed in children ”. For the authorities, “the results do not show any notable difference with the general population” concerning lead.
In the survey we conducted on this mining pollution in the Cévennes, specialists had however questioned the relevance of the screening, which was probably carried out outside the standard protocol. Indeed, the inhabitants had been invited to bring their urine samples themselves, while the sample should have been taken in a medical structure, at a fixed time. To date, the ARS is unreachable; It is therefore impossible to know if the methodology has since been modified.
45 complaints against X
For their part, the residents have decided to act to obtain compensation for their damage. With the court of Alès and the health pole of the tribunal de grande instance of Marseille, 45 complaints against X were lodged for “endangering the life of others”, “involuntary harm to physical integrity”, “pollution des eaux ”and“ deception of the merchandise endangering human and animal health ”.
Indeed, residents do not seem to have been made aware of these potential sources of contamination, especially when buying their home – an element that should have appeared on the act of purchase. The sensitive file was slow to come to light. The State launched a first survey to assess the health risks in 2004; the results of this study were buried for four years, before being brought to the attention of town halls. The inhabitants, for their part, did not receive recommendations to limit the risks of impregnation than in 2014.
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