What’s in the hair of senators? Mercury, pesticides, plasticizers, but also rare earths. This is revealed by an analysis conducted by the socialist group among twenty-six of its elected volunteers, including their president, Patrick Kanner. In July 2022, the latter entrusted a lock of their hair to the private and independent laboratory toxSeek, which screened for 1,800 organic pollutants and 49 metals. The results were released Tuesday, June 27.

“It’s an alert that we send”, comments to Agence France-Presse (AFP) the senator of Lot Angèle Préville, at the initiative of this study. “If it’s in our hair, that means we’re contaminated”, adds the elected official, very committed to the environment – in particular against plastic pollution -, which is also the most preserved among the elected officials who were analyzed.

The analyzes also revealed in 93% of the senators a presence of lanthanides (the so-called “rare” earths) higher than the control population of the laboratory. Lanthanides are metals and metal compounds used in the manufacture of high-tech objects that have invaded our daily lives: smartphone chips, laptop screens, electric and hybrid car batteries, LEDs… This prevalence greater than the population general can probably be explained, according to toxSeek, by the significant and regular use of communication tools by elected officials.

Not surprisingly, mercury contaminates all of the senators tested, who are also all contaminated with at least one pesticide. Forty-five different products (herbicides, fungicides, insecticides) have been identified, including a pesticide banned in Europe since 2008, carbofuran. Finally, the plasticizer dioctyl phthalate was detected in 69% of elected officials. Plasticizers are used to give flexibility to plastics.

“Our way of life weighs on our health quality, that’s clear,” notes the president of the socialist group, Patrick Kanner, who is one of the senators tested. “When I’m in Paris, morning, noon and evening I eat outside, and I don’t control what I consume”, testifies the senator from the North, in whom rare earths, mercury, pesticides, phthalates were found – chemical substances used as plasticizers – and paraben – a preservative mainly used in cosmetics.

For Matthieu Davoli, co-founder of the toxSeek group, with the exception of rare earths, the results “are very consistent with what we usually see” in the population. This indicates “repeated and regular” exposure to pollutants present in food and cosmetic or hygiene products. He notes that “long-term contamination can bring endocrine disrupting effects and lead to chronic, autoimmune, neurodegenerative diseases, cancers…”

“Modes of production and consumption in our society that create new diseases”

Regarding lanthanides, seven senators have “significant contamination”, including Yan Chantrel, representing the French living outside France, in this case in Canada. After changing his habits, he agreed to be retested next fall, with two of his colleagues who declared symptoms that could be associated with intolerance to magnetic fields (significant fatigue, headaches, etc.).

Cutting off the Wi-Fi at night, not using your smartphone as an alarm clock… these are small gestures to practice on a daily basis to act individually. The senator also insists that public health issues be “fully integrated” into environmental policies. “This questions the production and consumption patterns of our society, which ultimately create new diseases,” he warns.

The National Assembly is no exception. On Wednesday, Green MP Nicolas Thierry will present to the press the results of an analysis of per- and polyfluoroalkyl substances (PFAS), better known as “eternal pollutants”, carried out in the hair of fourteen MPs.

Already in 2017, seven personalities in ecology, including Nicolas Hulot, José Bové, Yannick Jadot and Delphine Batho, had lent themselves to a hair analysis which had shown the presence of endocrine disruptors.