INTERVIEW
224 people were admitted to the emergency room in Rouen after the Lubrizol chemical factory fire a few days earlier. The Regional Health Agency (ARS) of Normandy also indicated that eight of them were hospitalized in the wake. On Friday, only one patient remained hospitalized. Regarding food, 187 samples of agricultural and food products were made in Normandy and Hauts-de-France, said Bruno Ferreira, General Director of Food, during a press conference Friday.
Invited by Laurent Mariotte in "La table des bons vivants", Gilles Salvat, Deputy Director General for Research at ANSES (National Agency for Food Safety, Environment and Labor), returned on the health recommendations to be followed after the fire. "The first recommendations made by the prefecture were good: do not consume fruits and vegetables on which soot was deposited because there is a risk that the toxic substances remain.Then, it will take several weeks to pick mushrooms ", he said at the microphone of Europe 1.
"No risks with tap water"
Regarding the marketing of foodstuffs, the Ministry of Agriculture has taken a number of precautions. "The non-commercialization of cattle milk has been decided, but it must be remembered that cows have been exposed like everyone else by air, so it is less dangerous because dioxins are especially harmful by ingestion. therefore, food and food production "directly impacted by soot must be monitored.
Another concern for residents: tap water turned brown. Is it consumable? "The drinking water network was never affected in this case because the sources that feed the city of Rouen are deep water tables, so they have not been affected, says Gilles Salvat. no risks with tap water ".
The work of ANSES now is to "prioritize the types of risks that we can have with this type of accident". A committee of independent experts will be appointed, according to Gilles Salvat, to work on the results of analysis from a reference laboratory. "This will allow us, week after week, to monitor the evolution of contamination by certain toxic substances and this will give us an idea of the risk by the population," he detailed.