Word of mouth has always been silently the same for years: it's hard to talk about health in the workplace. Blackmail has always been subtle and latent. In this land of state predators, and beyond, the environmental problem, however, was carved loud and clear in every ravine. From the poison dumps, scattered far and wide, to those chimneys facing the sky, as if nothing from up there could ever settle back on the head of this territory. So, instead, it was, dramatically. The data, those on life and death, on diseases and causes, have always been a taboo, to be hidden, not to be asked. Yet there would have been some to discover, to understand and remedy, where this was still possible. Everything seemed to flow in silence, in indifference, until that perception of an unhealthy environment to keep track of crashed into reality.

Sos mortality

We wrote it in the first episode of our survey on health and the environment in this land forgotten by all. In Sulcis, that of the six municipalities of the area around the industrial area, Calasetta, Carbonia, Carloforte, Gonnesa, Portoscuso and San Giovanni Suergiu, the findings are thrilling: deaths from respiratory diseases are 50% more of any other territory. People die much more and from diseases that affect the lungs, trachea and bronchi. A fact that alone should constitute a real health alarm to be submitted, without further delay, to the attention of an extraordinary and urgent health screening plan, serious and credible, of the entire population, including the launch of an impressive Plan Marshall for environmental remediation to eliminate the causes of yesterday and today of this nefarious "mortality" effect. The risk that data of this importance, such as those revealed by the investigation of our newspaper, could end up in general oblivion is latent, making the indifference even more devastating than the "respiratory" deaths recorded by health reports.

"The only exceptions are ..."

Reports that remain secret have a code name, Standardized Mortality Ratio, Standardized Mortality Report. In the dossier finished in our hands, the acronym SMR should serve to ease the reading of those analyzes. The authors also try to water down the crucial points with premises and formulations all aimed at making reality less harsh. Then, however, if you do the additions and subtractions of words added as a sweetener for the outside, you realize that the statements are shot: they write to you as a premise that there are no excesses of deaths from tumors in all the municipalities and then open a parenthesis that stops your breath. They declare no significant excess, and then add, as if nothing had happened: "the only exceptions are the males of the Municipality of Portoscuso who instead show a significant excess of colorectal cancers (an excess that is not recorded among the females of the same municipality)" .

At the school of "mitigation"

The editors of the report signed by T.En Italy Solution SpA resort as a mantra to the rule of anticipating the hard blow with as many instrumentally positive affirmations. They tempt us with encrypted formulas and get to write: "only males are an exception". As if that "exception" were a very marginal observation. All data that appear today for the first time, with a premise that allows us to understand the historical approach to this story: "With reference to the province of Southern Sardinia it must be observed - it is written in the report - that the relative population and mortality data to this province they are only available starting from 2018 ». Total darkness first. The revelation of 50% higher mortality from respiratory diseases in Sulcis, however, does not mean that silence is taking steps backwards. The dossier reads: "It should be noted that, with regard to deaths, hospitalizations and the incidence of pathologies for which a register was available (tumors, malformations), Rina Consulting SpA on behalf of Snam, with the certified e-mail of 1 July 2021 requested the competent bodies for indicators referring to the most recent data available. At the time of issue of this document, no response has been received from these entities ". Thirteen additional months of silence, eloquent, without appeal. The tumor findings, the respiratory diseases that emerge from this report risk, therefore, being the tip of the iceberg.

Black hole

To understand the black "hole" of the analyzes, of the lack of feedback on the territory, we went beyond the data. In recent weeks we have revealed the incredibly surreal story of those plastic "buckets" scattered here and there to collect dust and pollution, positioned in pleasant places, out of all common sense even for the most profane. Buckets model "olives in brine" branded Arpas, Regional Agency for Environmental Protection of Sardinia, placed under the trees to collect nothing. We waited in vain for a telephone ring, a press release, a note explaining the goodness of that type of analysis, as rudimentary as it is devoid of any scientific value. The silence of the institutions and bodies in charge has done nothing but confirm the ephemeral function of that insignificant "collection" of pollution. And, in fact, in years of alleged analysis, little or nothing has emerged from those “olive-type buckets in brine” placed under oaks or eucalyptus a stone's throw from the landfills or from the disused chimneys of the Portovesme industrial area. The analyzes, however, in this poisoned land, do not stop at those buckets. In the reports ended up in our hands we talk about the monitoring network, the theoretically more sophisticated one, for the detailed analysis of the most dangerous pollutants, the notorious fine dust, capable of "piercing" lungs and more. The case of Portoscuso is the most relevant. Control units disappeared, deleted from the reports, hidden under the vegetation, without an objective confirmation, in positions that are, to say the least, disconcerting. In the town of Portoscuso they have placed three.

Inside Portoscuso

We went to find them. The first, the hypothetically most important one, has a code name: CenPS4. Its location is at the intersection of via Palermo and via Pisa. The horizon is unmistakable: the giant Enel tower stands out against the rarefied sky. A heap of rust and neglect, but above all surrounded by trees and buildings. The branches and leaves "protect" the sensors, as if they were to prevent recording what the air drags with impunity into the streets of the town. The question arises: in that corner were the plants or the monitoring unit placed first? Is it possible that no one perceived what was happening in that fulcrum of theoretical atmospheric analysis? Certainly the technician who accompanies us has seen all the colors, but he never would have imagined that one could dare so much.

Down

The synthesis is seraphic: useless control unit, data staggered and mitigated by obvious obstacles to the functioning of the sensors. We move to the edge of the town: the second control unit is CenPS2. The station is out of order. Among the thousands of pages of the report, the rest is written: "It is important to note that the CENPS2 station does not comply, due to its location, with the criteria established by current legislation (in terms of distances from the emission sources) and is not representative of the pollution average of the area. For this reason, the CENPS2 station was decommissioned on 01/10/2018 ». Obviously, in 4 years, never replaced or moved. The analyzes were limited to excluding it as nothing was from the count, as if eliminating one of the three ECUs were a simple arithmetic calculation. But there is more, in the air quality dossiers of the previous year we can read: "It is important to note that the CENPS2 station is located in a particularly high pollution point (" hot spot ") which differs from the criteria provided. by current legislation (in terms of distances from emission sources) such as not to be representative of the average pollution of the area ". In short, they have removed the one where the recorded pollution was greater. Everyone can ask themselves a question and give themselves an answer. In Portoscuso there remains one: the CenPS7. They "threw" it behind the town cemetery. The visual horizon is emblematic: placed in front of the chimneys, with the town cemetery behind it. Not quite a auspicious position.

© Riproduzione riservata