One year after the notorious cases in Rose-Belle, where school children fell ill, apparently as a result of exposure to ethanol, similar incidents hit the headlines once again early last week. Some fifty pupils and teachers from the government primary school of Grande Rivière North West (GRNW) had to be taken to hospital. Parents have been blaming Les Gaz Industriels factory but nothing has been proved so far.

After the problem led to parents? protests outside the school, peace seems to have returned as no other pupil has suffered from any problem since last Thursday. Tests were done on the pupils, following which it was concluded that gas was not responsible for their condition. The authorities have also dismissed this theory for the moment although tests are being done to find the cause of this incident. ?There has been no concrete evidence that there was gas in the air so far; the ministry officials on the site have not been able to say whether there was a gas leak coming from Les Gaz Industriels Ltée.?

The ministries of Education, Environment, Health and Works, as well as some teachers, suggest that there could have been some kind of psychosis in the school. Although this has not been confirmed, officials say that while the first case could have been a genuine one, the others could well have resulted from a psychosis. After what happened in Rose-Belle, people could be anxious about such problems and tend to panic. It?s the first time after over fifty years of being next to the gas factory that this school is facing such problems.

The factory has been keen on cooperating with the authorities but it is adamant that it is not responsible for the problems. ?On Monday and Tuesday a few pupils felt unwell, But the factory wasn?t working during school time. We?ve been here for 52 years and we?ve never had problems because we do our job within strict security norms,? the general manager, Vincent Labat, explained.

Mixture of oil and natural gas

However, the factory has already accepted to make concessions to calm parents down. The wall between the school and the factory will be raised to three metres compared to one meter now. Likewise, acetylene ? a mixture of oil and natural gas ? will not be produced during class time for the two coming weeks.

Parents now seems to have calmed down. After a meeting of the authorities and the factory management, the atmosphere is less tense. ?There is a strong desire to get the situation back to normal as soon as possible before the CPE exams,? a representative of the ministry of Environment says.