“We would have liked the ARS or the State to do it. We want to change things. This is about the health of our children,” underlines Gwenaëlle Mondet, the representative of the “studies and research” center of the Avenir Santé Environnement association, whose volunteers took strands of hair from nearly 70 children this Wednesday, April 10. ages 3 to 17. Last Monday, their urine had already been sent to a laboratory. The operation, carried out at the association's headquarters located in Périgny (Charente-Maritime), is part of the “NEEXT” citizen project, an acronym meaning “Our children exposed to toxic substances”. Objective: detect or not the presence of pollutants.
Founded in 2018, Avenir Santé Environnement has since campaigned to obtain a ban on synthetic pesticides and the start of a real agricultural transition. Children living in six municipalities (Périgny, Saint-Rogatien, Clavette, Bourgneuf, Dompierre-sur-Mer, and Montroy) in the La Rochelle area were selected for these samples. “I wonder about the health of my daughters. I hope there won't be any, but the idea, if there are pesticides, is to push decision-makers to act,” says Sébastien Kalt, who came with his two teenage daughters aged 10 and 14. Based in Saint-Rogatien, in the Aunis plain, this trained agronomist let his daughters choose whether or not to participate in this operation: “They hesitated before accepting. I am not naturally worried but pesticides are found everywhere,” he adds.
“I want to know, it’s important”
Sandrine Piveteau accompanied her daughter and son aged 14 and 15. “We arrived from Lyon in 2016 and have since discovered the problem in the Aunis plain. I want to know, it’s important, there are perhaps things to adjust on a daily basis,” explains this mother. A hundred hairs had to be taken from each young person, up to 1 cm from the root. Each of these hairs keeps even a tiny trace of the pollutants that have passed through their body and thus allows them to go back in time. The first results will be sent to the association within four months. Avenir Santé Environnement will then propose a public restitution in the presence of scientists.