The recognition of prostate cancer as an occupational disease for farmers in Guadeloupe and Martinique is not enough according to Olivier Serva, who recalls that more than 90% of the population on site has been contaminated with chlordecone.
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“This is largely insufficient progress”, declared Wednesday, December 22 on franceinfo Olivier Serva, LREM deputy of Guadeloupe and president of the overseas delegation to the national assembly, about the compensation of West Indian farmers.
Prostate cancers caused by chlordecone are now recognized as occupational diseases for farmers in Guadeloupe and Martinique. 92 million euros have been advanced to allow their compensation.
Olivier Serva said, however: “We ask the State to continue to assume its responsibilities”, and especially “on land decontamination and compensation for victims, not just those who worked in the fields thirty years ago and who today are not so numerous.” The Guadeloupe deputy also recalled that all West Indians “have the highest incidence rate of prostate cancer in the world”.
First, the MP deplores that this measure only takes into account prostate cancer: “It only concerns men, it is a measure that I would call misogynist because there were women who worked in the fields.” He also mentions the undeclared workers, many at that time: “These people hardly exist, and the panel of people involved is relatively small.”
Olivier Serva also recalled that 92% of Guadeloupeans and 95% of Martinicans were contaminated with chlordecone, and 40% of West Indian lands are impregnated with it. “for another 500 to 600 years”. This is why he insists on the decontamination of these territories: “We need to be able to recultivate edible food in Guadeloupe. Today, the tubers planted are impregnated with chlordecone and are therefore not edible.”