The mayor of an idyllic Italian island has refused to close a beach featured in an Oscar-winning film, despite warnings from environmental protection agents that the sea contains high levels of E coli and faecal material.
A picturesque island in the Bay of Naples, Procida can boast of being just as beautiful as the nearby Amalfi coast, but without the tourist crowds. The island gained fame through the Oscar-winning film Il Postino (The Postman), a love story following the protagonist around Procida on his bicycle.
But now the island’s reputation as a travel destination has been dented after inspectors from the regional environmental protection agency (Arpac) found high levels of E coli and faecal bacteria in the waters at Pozzo Vecchio beach.
Arpac ruled that the bacteria levels were above the limit for safe swimming last week and told Mayor Dino Ambrosino to ban bathers. But Ambrosino refused, arguing that the danger had probably passed during the 48 hours of lab testing: “There’s a very strong current ... The water is very clean and for the large part of the summer they’ve always found the sea clean.”
The mayor put Arpac’s discovery down to heavy rain, which hit the island the day before the tests. The results of a second round of tests will be released on Thursday, and Ambrosino has promised to ban swimming if the bacteria is still present. In the meantime, however, the mayor said bathers were continuing to enjoy the waters of Pozzo Vecchio: “I haven’t swum, but my children have. It’s near to my house and I would never put a child at risk.”
Jeroen Ensink, a lecturer in public health at the London School of Hygiene and Tropical Medicine, said the situation could potentially pose a serious health risk, although the danger is difficult to determine due to the variety of bacteria. He said local authorities were meant to treat waste and it was not meant to be pumped into sea, although authorities had been slow to implement the EU rule in some parts of Europe. “I would not be surprised if in certain parts of the south some of the original sewer pipes still end in the sea,” he said.
