The public health unit of the public prosecutor's office of Marseilles opened a preliminary investigation Wednesday for "endangering the life of others" and "involuntary injuries with incapacity greater than three months", said Xavier Tarabeux to AFP, confirming information Parisian. It follows the complaint filed in August by the parents of Louis, born without fingers in his right hand in 2012, in Ain.
The investigation was entrusted to the central office of fight against the attacks on the environment and public health (Oclaesp) and the gendarmerie of Lyon, said the public prosecutor. The Lyonnais lawyer of the family of the little boy, Me Fabien Rajon had seized the tribunal de grande instance of Marseille which has one of the two poles of public health in France, with that of Paris.
"Transverse agenesis of the upper limbs"
First complaint to be filed, according to Rajon, in the case of children born with a malformation of the upper limbs (often the arms), it followed the decision of a committee of experts not to continue the investigations on case of children born with this malformation in the Ain. In October 2018, the Public Health France had indicated that it did not identify any cause for suspected cases in this department and considered that there was no "excess of cases" in the Ain.
In February 2019, a new survey was conducted by Public Health France and the ANS health security agency on these children - 20 in total - born in Morbihan, Ain and Loire-Atlantique with a "transverse limb agenesis". "(ATMS). This committee recommended, in July, to conduct additional investigations only for cases located in Morbihan. In Ain, scientists have again concluded to "the absence of excess of cases".
The trail of pesticides and toxic releases privileged
In Loire-Atlantique, they said they wanted to wait "the end of the year" to complete the census of cases and rule on a possible "excess".
In Ain, the families of children with malformations question potential groundwater responsibilities for problems on the sanitation or water distribution network. The hypothesis of pollution by pesticides or toxic discharges is one of the preferred routes by Emmanuelle Amar, responsible for the malformation registry in the Rhône-Alpes (Remera), who had given the alert in the Ain.