http://www.sfgate.com/cgi-bin/article.cgi?file=/news/archive/2003/08/22/international0640EDT0483.DTL
Friday, August 22,
2003
San Francisco Chronicle
France
turns attention to farmers devastated in heat wave
KIM HOUSEGO, Associated Press Writer
(08-22) 08:27 PDT PARIS
(AP) -- France's government turned its
attention Friday to farmers whose animals died by the millions
and whose crops withered in a heat wave estimated to have killed
up to 10,000 people.
Agriculture Minister
Herve Gaymard estimated that the damage to
French farms was between $1.1 billion and $4.4 billion.
He promised financial
aid but did not say how much, noting France
is already in trouble with the European Union for overspending.
"Everyone knows
the cost is high for farmers, and national
solidarity must play a role," he told Europe-1 radio.
Prime Minister Jean-Pierre Raffarin was to host talks with
farmers' representatives later Friday.
Jean-Michel Lemetayer,
president of the FNSEA farmers' union,
said agriculture was devastated.
"The atmosphere
in the countryside is extremely morose,"
he told The Associated Press. "Every day without rain
aggravates the situation."
Up to 4 million chickens
died, as did another 500,000 set aside
for breeding -- a loss likely to lead to price increases,
France's main poultry farmers' association said. Some 300,000
rabbits also perished.
The wheat harvest is
expected to drop by 15 percent, compared
with last year, and corn production by nearly 28 percent,
said France's largest cereal growers' union.
A day after promising
that "everything will be done" to correct
health system failings exposed by the crisis, President Jacques
Chirac paid a private visit Friday to a hospital for the elderly
in northern Paris, meeting doctors and comforting patients,
his office said.
On Thursday, in his
first public comments on the heat wave,
Chirac said many of the elderly victims "died alone in their
homes."
"These dramas
again shed light on the solitude of many of
our aged or handicapped citizens," said Chirac, who has been
criticized for not speaking about the crisis earlier.
Gilles Catoire, the
Socialist mayor of Clichy, a Paris suburb,
called for a national day of mourning for the victims.
France's longest and
hottest heat wave, with temperatures that
topped 104 in the first two weeks of August, probably caused
some 10,000 deaths, said Hubert Falco, secretary of state for
the elderly. The government says a complete death toll is still
being compiled.
In a separate interview
with Le Monde newspaper, Falco said
the crisis showed France is coping badly with aging.
"Mortality linked
to the heat wave was highest" among people
over 85 -- who now number 1.2 million in France, and in 10 years
will total 2.4 million, he said.
Nearly 80 percent of
retirement facilities are short-staffed,
he said. "Our society was not prepared," Falco said.
Falco told another
newspaper, La Provence, that he envisions
a new emergency plan for retirement homes, where many victims
died. He said he wants to be able to mobilize personnel quickly
in case of disasters and decentralize decision-making.
While other European
governments have not reported the huge death
toll of France, signs are emerging of significant spikes in deaths
in several countries where temperatures also soared.
The Central Bureau
for Statistics said the heat claimed
500-1,000 lives in the Netherlands, and Portugal's Health
Ministry estimated more than 1,300 dead.
Germany, which was
not as hot and is counting its dead more
slowly, has tallied just 30 heat-related deaths.
Italy's Health Ministry
has refused to give figures, but calls
by The Associated Press to several major cities found marked
increases in deaths compared with last year. Genoa had 693
in the first 18 days of August, compared with 475 in the
whole month last year. In Turin, 732 died, more than 500
of them aged over 70, compared with 388 last year.
A Health Ministry official
said Italian officials are
investigating how many people were killed in the heat wave.
In France, morgues
and funeral homes overflowed with bodies
and painful questions are being asked about why so many
elderly people were left alone.
"People have lost
their sense of responsibility," said Nadia
Finkielman, lending support to a grieving friend at a Paris
morgue. "They think the government is going to resolve every
problem in their life."
