Xiao Gong cleared his throat and said loudly: "Their diet is a typical southern diet, with rice as the staple food, rice is local rice supplied by the local supermarket, vegetables are local seasonal vegetables and fruits in Nanwan Town, as well as local fish and shellfish caught from the Nanwan River. ”

Xiao Gong deliberately accented "fish and shellfish", and he also knew about the Minamata disease incident in Japan, so he targeted local aquatic products.

Xiao Zhao, another young man from the health department, raised a different opinion, "There was no mercury detected in the wave fish in Nanwan Town brought back by Director Nan yesterday." ”

Xiao Gong: "Those wave fish are bought in the seafood street, the origin is not clear, the wave fish in Nanwan Town is famous, many shops are under the banner of Nanwan Town wave fish, in fact, I don't know where to buy it." ”

Xiao Zhao: "Nanwan Town is the largest supply base of wave fish in our Lianhai City, a small part is wild, most of them are farmed, I have a relative who opened a shop on the seafood street, he said, the source of the seafood shop on the street is basically the seafood farm at the mouth of Nanwan Town, and there are very few foreign and wild ones. ”

Xiao Gong pouted, "One test doesn't explain the problem, the Nanwan River is so big, the pollution may not come from anywhere, the fish may be fine, but what about the seaweed? The residents of Nanwan Town also like to eat seaweed, kelp, and rice, and the local rice is irrigated with the water of the Nanwan River, which may also be a problem with rice." ”

Xiao Gong's words have already begun to guess.

Xiao Zhao: "Why are you always suspicious of the Nam Van River, it may also be acute mercury poisoning caused by foreign food, I asked the patient's family, and a lot of what they eat comes from other places." ”

Xiao Gong: "There are a lot of things coming in from other places, all kinds of nuts and snacks, but all the patients have not been in contact with them, and I suspect that it is the problem of the Nanwan River, the patients all live near the Nanwan River, and the Nanwan River must be polluted." ”

Xiao Zhao: "But the water in the Nanwan River is very clear, there is no sign of pollution, and besides, the Nanwan River is monitored by the Environmental Protection Bureau, and if it is polluted, the environmental protection department will definitely respond." ”

A few years ago, a steel company wanted to settle in Nanwan Town, and then after the evaluation of the environmental protection department, because the pollution was too large, without environmental review, the government department gave up the introduction plan.

Two years ago, a newly established electrical appliance factory in the upper reaches of the Nam Van River was ordered to be rectified by the environmental protection department because of excessive emissions, and it was more than half a year before the factory resumed production.

Xiao Gong was silent for two seconds, and finally said: "I think it's still the problem of the Nanwan River, and the factories in the upper reaches of the Nanwan River are the focus of the investigation. ”

Nan Zhiqiao had just come to Lianhai City and did not know the distribution of local factories, and the factories in the upper reaches of the Nanwan River that Xiao Gong said should indeed be within the scope of investigation.

In response to the controversy between Xiao Gong and Xiao Zhao of the health department, Liang Lei explained to Nan Zhiqiao: "Lianhai City has done a comprehensive water environment monitoring, and the two groundwater monitoring points will do two monitoring in February and August every year, and the monitoring items include mercury content determination. The Nanwan River is a source of drinking water in towns and villages, and for river-type water sources, the environmental protection department is in accordance with the "Environmental Quality Standards for Surface Water", of which mercury is also a mandatory item. ”

Xiao Zhao: "If the environmental protection department does not detect excessive mercury levels in the environment outside of Nanwan Town, then what is the matter with these mercury poisoning patients?"

Xiao Gong: "Maybe the environmental protection department didn't monitor some places, maybe it's really food poisoning." ”

Xiao Gong's position is also uncertain.

There are too many possible reasons for poisoning, and Liang Lei, Xiao Zhao and Xiao Gong don't know where to start for a while.

"Tomorrow we will continue to take samples, which will cover the entire town of Nanwan, and collect not only human specimens, but also environmental specimens," Nan Zhiqiao suggested. Human specimens are collected for hair and urine, and blood can be collected if available. For environmental specimens, the main thing is to collect water samples near the Nam Van River, as well as algae, fish and shrimp, and shellfish in the river. Samples should also be taken for common foods in residents' homes, including salt, oil, rice, noodles, and various condiments. ”

Liang Lei sighed with an exaggerated expression: "Do all the residents of Nanwan Town want to take samples? That's a population of more than 20,000." ”

"Well, try to collect as much as you can. Nan Zhiqiao replied in the affirmative.

Xiao Gong and Xiao Zhao, who are usually in charge of sanitary sampling, also complained to Liang Lei: "This workload is too large, not only is it a problem of manpower, but our laboratory does not have so many testing reserve reagents." ”

With a population of more than 20,000 and a doubling of the number of specimens, I don't know when I will do it with just a few people from the CDC's laboratory department.

Ye Zhenzhen, who has been listening to the opinions of the audience, thought that when the food poisoning incident occurred in Liang Kee Restaurant, Nan Zhiqiao collected food samples from the entire food street and sent them to a third-party testing agency, hundreds of samples, and the results were available within 24 hours.

"You can ask a third-party testing agency to help. Ye Zhenzhen reminded softly.

Nan Zhiqiao smiled knowingly, "Well, I know two third-party testing agencies, they can undertake the testing of urine mercury, mercury, and blood mercury for residents of Nanwan Town, and the results can be obtained within five working days for 40,000 specimens." ”

Xiao Zhao and Xiao Gong breathed a sigh of relief, and the workload became acceptable by Nan Zhiqiao's arrangement.

Liang Lei has a wide network of local contacts and knows how to mobilize the power of the grassroots, "I will take the sample of residents, and I will say hello to the Guanhai County Center for Disease Control and Prevention, as well as the local township health center and community, and collect from schools, communities, and factories." ”

——

The next day, it was still the division of labor.

This time, it was a group of Liang Lei and Xiao Zhao, who led the staff of the local primary health department to start sampling the residents of Nanwan Town.

Liang Lei and Xiao Zhao are the organizers and manage all the collected specimens in a unified manner.

The other group is Nan Zhiqiao, Ye Zhenzhen and Xiao Gong, as well as two staff members from the environmental protection department of Lianhai City.

Because of the sudden diagnosis of mercury poisoning, the Lianhai Municipal Health and Family Planning Commission and a number of relevant departments set up an emergency working group, including the municipal environmental protection department.

The group is mainly responsible for collecting water samples from the Nam Van River and biological specimens from Hanoi.

The Nanwan River originates from Maling Mountain in the west, flows through Lianhai City, and joins several tributaries, and when it flows to Nanwan Town, it is already a large river with a deep water depth and wide surface, and flows out of the Nanwan River in Nanwan Town, forming a vast wetland at the mouth of the sea.

As early as more than a year ago, this estuary wetland was planned to be developed into the largest wetland park in Lianhai City.

Nanwan Estuary Wetland Park, covering an area of about 4,000 hectares, has a wide range of rivers and clear lakes in the wetland, a variety of migratory birds inhabit here, and there are many seafood farms near the coast.

The water samples to be collected by the Nanzhiqiao team this time include the upstream, midstream, and downstream of the river, as well as the wetland section of the estuary, as well as the offshore waters.

In this sampling, Nan Zhiqiao did not drive his own off-road vehicle, but sat in the on-site car of the Lianhai City Center for Disease Control and Prevention, and went to the upper reaches of the Nanwan River with other team members.