Tap water in two French municipalities has been linked to 656 cases of gastroenteritis.
- The characteristic symptoms of gastroenteritis are abdominal pain, nausea, diarrhea, vomiting and sometimes fever.
- 656 people living in Saint-Didier en Velay or Séauve-sur-Semène suffered from these demonstrations.
- According to a new investigation, they were poisoned by tap water.
Several cases of digestive symptoms among residents of Saint-Didier-en-Velay and Séauve-sur-Semène have been reported by health professionals to the prefecture of Haute-Loire and to Auvergne-Rhône-Alpes Regional Health Agency on Monday, September 2, 2024.
“In order to better understand the extent of this epidemic and to research its cause, Public Health Francein conjunction with the Auvergne-Rhône-Alpes Regional Health Agency and the Haute-Loire prefecture, carried out an online survey among the residents of these two municipalities”explain the authors of the survey.
The online survey was distributed by local relays from Tuesday, September 3 and was accessible until Tuesday, September 10. Anyone living in Saint-Didier-en-Velay or Séauve-sur-Semène (sick or not) was invited to respond to the questionnaire.
Gastroenteritis and tap water: more than 900 answers
The online survey collected more than 900 responses. Analysis of the questionnaires completed by people living in Saint-Didier en Velay or Séauve-sur-Semène shows a high number of people (656, or 13% of the inhabitants of the two municipalities) reporting symptoms characteristic of gastroenteritis (abdominal pain, nausea, diarrhea, vomiting, fever), most of the time with a resolution within 24 hours.
“The symptoms occurred mainly during the last weekend of August (Saturday 31 August and Sunday 1 September)” specifies the Auvergne-Rhône-Alpes Regional Health Agency on its website. “It appears that people reporting consuming tap water for drinking (sometimes or exclusively) had a higher risk of being ill than people who reported not drinking tap water”, she adds.
Furthermore, 191 people (including 145 sick people) reported having noticed a problem with the quality of the water distributed (abnormal colour, taste or odour) during the month of August.
Gastroenteritis: “dThe results support a one-off contamination of the water network”
“The large number of sick people whose only exposure was the consumption of water distributed in the municipalities of Saint-Didier-en-Velay and Séauve-sur-Semène points to the hypothesis of contamination of the water network of these two municipalities,” investigators estimate. “The distribution of cases across the entire territory of these two municipalities reinforces this hypothesis,” they analyze.
“The rapid decrease in the number of cases from Monday September 2 points towards a probably one-off contamination that occurred in the last days of August,” do they complete.
All the analyses carried out by the operator on the tap water network show to date results that comply with the required health standards. Therefore, the tap water distributed in the municipalities of Saint-Didier-en-Velay and Séauve-sur-Semène can now be consumed in complete safety.
