MONTREAL – In the thick of the summer heat many are looking for a place to cool off but some Quebec lakes are dangerous places to swim in due to blue-green algae.
Last June, David Provencal and his son moved into a lake house on the St.Tropez campground in St-Beatrix, an area about an hour and a half north of Montreal, in the Lanaudière region.
The family was expecting to spend the summer enjoying the beach and cooling off in the adjoining lake.
Instead they were confronted by a notice that the lake is completely closed to swimming while the Quebec environment ministry analyses water samples.
The government is investigating concerns over blue-green algae.
“It’s a bummer, the whole reason we bought this house was to swim,” Provencal said.
Coming in contact, let alone swimming, in water contaminated with blue-green algae can cause a variety of problems – from skin rashes to diarrhea – and can even can trigger an asthma attack.
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What upset the Provencal family was that they weren’t even warned by government officials.
It was their neighbour, the owner of the campground, who let them in on the little secret.
The campground owner told Global News that the timing of the water ban couldn’t be worse, as closing the beach during the construction holiday is drying up his business.
Meanwhile environmental activist Daniel Green is furious with the government, describing the issue as a “cover-up.”
“Essentially the Charest government’s blue-green algae plan was failure,” Green told Global News.
Back in 2007, the Quebec government developed a $12-million action plan to fight the pond scum that closed 90 lakes across Quebec.
Green thinks the algae is just as present and toxic now as it was back then.
“The only reason we’re not talking about it is the Quebec government has decided to purposefully not publish lakes affected by blue-green algae,” he said.
But the Quebec Environment Minister Pierre Arcand argues that the government’s hands-off policy is meant to reduce unnecessary panic.
“What has changed over the last few years is that every time there was one blue-green algae we were declaring it,” Arcand told Global News.
“Now we wait until the situation is really out of control in a particular lake.”
This is no consolation for people who live near contaminated lakes or to environmentalists who fear blue-green algae levels will get worse before they get better.
Sadly, for those at the St.Tropez camping ground, notice of the contamination comes too late for their summer fun.
But summer fun (or the lack of it) isn’t the only issue – as environmentalist Green so aptly put it, “The Charest government’s approach seems to be what ‘you don’t know won’t hurt you’ – but blue-green algae may very well hurt you.”
To learn more about what blue-green algae is, click here.
To find out how to protect yourself from exposure to contaminated water, click here.
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