Seveso is a municipality located 20 km north of Milan.

Until 1976 Industrie Chimiche Meda Società

Azionaria (ICMESA) was located at the border with the town of Desio. ICMESA was a chemical
industry of the Swiss company Givaudan (from 1963 belonging to the multinational pharmaceutical
company Hoffmann-La Roche). ICMESA has since 1971 manufactured 2,4,5-trichlorophenol, a toxic
substance used in herbicides and for the preparation of hexachlorophene (cosmetics).
Since the start of the production (late 40s) ICMESA caused a number of environmental problems in
the surrounding area, especially pollution of watercourses and livestock deaths, never seriously
contested by local institutions.
On 10th of July 1976, temperature and pressure in a reactor suddenly increased causing the
opening of the safety valve and the diffusion in the atmosphere of a reddish cloud, which soon
began to settle on a very populated area. It was attributed to human error.

Since July 14th effects of the explosion on the population, animals and vegetation were visible. The
mayor of Seveso issued the day after an order in which it was forbidden to manipulate and eat
vegetables grown near the factory. ICMESA's workers refused to continue working. The company,
after a week revealed the name of the toxic substance: 2,3,7,8-tetrachlorodibenzo-p-dioxin (TCDD),
highly toxic, carcinogenic and teratogenic.

Hundreds have been affected by a form of skin rash: lacloracne. On the 21st of July, the director and
the deputy director of ICMESA were arrested for "culpable disaster" and a judicial process started.
On July 24th, the mayor of Seveso ordered 179 people to leave their homes to be hosted in a
residence. Subsequently, the same thing happened to many other people, even in other towns.

The affected area was divided into three areas (A, B and R) according to the level of pollution. Zone
A (the most affected), already evacuated and extended for about 15 hectares, was also militarized.

On 7 August 1976, the Minister of Health, Dal Falco, and the Minister of Justice, Bonifacio, with the
consent of the Prime Minister Andreotti, authorized therapeutic abortions for women in the area.

The approximation and the slowness of the remediation interventions has caused irritation in the
evacuated population that, initially disorganized, then gathered in the "national coordination
committee", on several occasions attempted to return to their homes.

On 11th of October 1976 a group of displaced people occupied the area A and blocked the highway
Milano-Meda, asking to restart the reclamation process. So the politicians began talking about an
incinerator to remove the contaminated material. Against this project, in December the highway
Milano-Meda was again blocked. The movement forced policy to reclaim by isolating the
contaminated material.

In June 1977, the Regional Council approved the remediation program. In October, the first
evacuated families returned to their homes, although some had been demolished. The reclamation
was limited to the area A and took more than 10 years. The land, the animals slaughtered and also
the machinery used for the reclamation finished in two large containment tanks. Above these two
tanks, the Natural Park "Bosco delle Querce” was then created.

In a criminal trial Givaudan offered 103.634.000.000 of Italian Lira to local authorities and to 25
plaintiffs, in return for their annulment and promises to continue later reimbursements to private
entities. In 1983 the agreement was accepted and the Committee 5D (Difesa Diritti Danneggiati
Dalla Diossina - Defence Rights Damaged From Dioxin) was created in order to defend the rights of
citizens affected, including the cost of reimbursements.

On 23 May 1986, the Criminal Appeal issued the definitive judgment against ICMESA, mitigated by
the transaction made by Givaudan with the plaintiffs. However, Givaudan's promises to continue the
compensation was dismissed, except in rare cases of unfavorable civil convictions.

In April 2005 a civil trial against ICMESA was started before the Monza Court for moral damages
caused to 1.132 people, all part of the committee 5D and the residents in areas B and A. The trial
was lost both at first instance (2006), and in the Court of Appeal (2010).

In 2013 the Supreme Civil Court of Rome dismissed the appeal made by 326 people of the initial
1132, now forced again to pay court costs (approximately EUR 20,000).

The long-term health damage (the sharp increase in tumors is known) have never been quantified,
so there has never been a compensation for the population.

At the time of the incident, there were serious shortcomings in the areas of legislative and
professional safety and in the information for the citizens on the risks for environment and health.
The new European legislation on chemical industrial equipment was launched in 1982 with the
Council Directive 82/501 / EEC, called Seveso Directive. A central part of the Directive (later
replaced by others) is constituted by the obligation to public information and fair safety measures.

In the aftermath of the disaster, at the end of August 1976, the Region asked the City of Seveso to
express an opinion on the position in the municipal area of an incineration plant that would occupy
an area of 36,000 m². The City Council, with one abstention, determined to place the plant in an area
located north of the cemetery.

This decision was challenged by the population to such a point that the City Council of Seveso, in
November, decided to repeal its decision of 29th August, and asked the Lombardy Region and the
Province of Milan to suspend the contract for the construction of the incinerator and to accept the
proposal of reclamation of the Committee of Civic Coordination. The latter suggested the method of
the controlled waste to solve the problem with the placement of the polluted material in concrete
caissons, pools, seismic and totally or partially embedded in the ground, covered with earth and
greenery. According to the proposal of the Committee, the caissons were to be placed on the ground
of ICMESA.

………………………………..
 Briefing: The Seveso Disaster
Seveso, Italy, saw one of Europe's worst environmental disasters
BY MARC LALLANILLA
Updated 09/14/17

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 A state policeman pins up warning signs around the town of Seveso in Italy,
following the area's contamination by a toxic cloud. Hulton Deutsch / Getty
Images

Few industrial accidents can match the severity of the Seveso disaster of 1976.
Despite the resulting long-term health problems and environmental risks,
however, the accidental release of gases including TCDD -- a form of cancer-
causing dioxin -- into a residential area of Italy had some positive legacies,
including the creation of tighter environmental regulations and health protections
throughout Europe.

Seveso: Before and After the Disaster

A small suburban town some 10 miles north of Milan, Italy, Seveso had a
population of about 17,000 in the 1970s. Other nearby cities include Desio, Cesano
Maderno and Meda; together, these formed a mix of urban, residential and small
farming areas. A local chemical plant, constructed many years earlier in Meda, was
owned by ICMESA, a subsidiary of pharmaceutical giant Hoffman-La Roche.

Overall, the plant was not perceived as a threat by the local population. All that
changed, however, on the afternoon of Saturday, July 10, 1976, as parts of the
plant were being shut down for the weekend. While residents of Seveso and the
surrounding area were tending their gardens, running errands or watching their
children play, one of the buildings in the chemical plant was getting dangerously
hot as cooling mechanisms were turned off.

When the temperature inside one of the plant's tanks reached a critical level, a
pressure release valve opened, and about six metric tons of toxic gas were emitted
from the facility.

The resulting gas cloud that drifted over the Seveso area contained an estimated
one kilogram of TCDD, technically known as 2,3,7,8-tetrachlorodibenzodioxin.

TCDD in Seveso

TCDD is one type of dioxin, a family of chemical compounds that are a by-product
of industrial activities like bleaching wood pulp, incinerating garbage, metal
smelting and chemical production.

Dioxin is also present in small amounts in the herbicide Agent Orange, which was
used throughout Southeast Asia during the Vietnam War.

Dioxin is universally recognized as a carcinogen (a cancer-causing agent). It's also

known to cause reproductive, immune and developmental effects in mammals,
and can cause severe liver problems in people exposed to high levels of the
compound. Chloracne, a serious skin condition that resembles very bad acne, can
also result from high exposures to dioxin.

Within a few hours after the ICMESA facility gas release, over 37,000 people
throughout the Seveso area were exposed to unprecedented levels of dioxin.
Among the first to suffer, however, were the area's animals. According to Time,
"One farmer saw his cat keel over, and when he went to pick up the body, the tail
fell off. When authorities dug the cat up for examination two days later, said the
farmer, all that was left was its skull."

Despite their exposure to high levels of dioxin, it was a few days before people
began to feel the effects: nausea, blurred vision, skin lesions and the development
of severe chloracne, particularly among children. As a result of the slow
development of symptoms, the area around Seveso was not immediately
evacuated.

Dead animals, especially chickens and rabbits kept as food, began to overwhelm
the city's resources, and many were slaughtered on an emergency basis to prevent
people from eating them. (Dioxin accumulates in fatty tissue, and can be ingested
by eating plants or animals that have been exposed to it.) By 1978, an estimated
80,000 animals were slaughtered.

The Legacy of Seveso

The response to the Seveso accident was widely criticized as slow and bungled.
Several days passed before it was announced that a gas containing dioxin had been
released from the facility; evacuation of the worst-affected areas took several
more days.

Research into the long-term health effects of the Seveso disaster is ongoing. One
study from 2008 found that babies born to women living in the contaminated area
at the time of the accident were about six times more likely to have altered thyroid
function than other babies.

Additionally, a 2009 report found an increase in breast and lymphatic cancers in

the area. However, other research into liver, immune, neurologic and reproductive
effects yielded no conclusive information.

Seveso and its residents continue to function as a kind of "living laboratory" into
the effects of dioxin exposure on people and animals. Throughout Europe, the
name Seveso is now associated with tough regulations that require any facilities
storing, manufacturing or handling hazardous materials to inform local authorities
and communities about the nature of their facility, and to create and publicize
measures to prevent and respond to any accident that may occur.
The ICMESA plant is now completely closed, and the Seveso Oak Forest park was
created above the buried facility. Beneath the wooded park, however, sits two
tanks that hold the remains of thousands of slaughtered animals, the destroyed
chemical plant and the soil that had the highest degree of dioxin contamination.