from Sunday Herald, 10 June 2012
The hugely popular National Museum of Scotland has been named as a new suspect in the investigation into the cause of the outbreak of Legionnaires’ disease in Edinburgh.
The UK government’s Health and Safety Executive (HSE) told the Sunday Herald that its inspectors visited the museum in Chambers Street on Friday as part of its continuing efforts to pinpoint the source of the infection.
On the same day it was announced that two million people have visited the museum since its £47 million upgrade ten months ago. It was said to have become the most popular tourist attraction in Scotland.
The HSE also confirmed that it had paid a visit to an Italian defence electronics company, Selex Galileo, at Crewe Toll in the city. This brings the number of sites whose cooling towers have been checked for the deadly legionella bacteria to six.
A spokeswoman for the National Museum of Scotland confirmed that it had received a “precautionary visit” from HSE inspectors. “They checked our documentation and procedures and there were no immediate concerns raised,” said a museum spokeswoman.
“We constantly test and monitor our water systems on an ongoing basis and undertook an extra chemical treatment earlier this week as a precaution.”
Selex Galileo said that it had complied with HSE and environmental health agencies. “Both were satisfied with our control procedures for legionnaires,” stated the company’s head of operations in Edinburgh, Peter Dillon.
The Sunday Herald can also reveal that one of the other suspect sites close to the centre of the outbreak – the Macfarlan Smith pharmaceutical factory, run by the Johnson Matthey company – has a poor health and safety record. It has been served five improvement notices by HSE since 2008 for breaches of health and safety rules.
Four of the notices were in 2010, for exposing employees to risks from dangerous substances and for failing to keep proper records of exhaust ventilation plant tests.
The fifth was issued in 2008 "for failure to limit the consequences to people from a major accident".
Debra Boni, Macfarlan Smith’s human resources director, insisted the breaches were “totally unrelated” to the control of legionella. “We fully complied with the requirements of the notices,” she said.
“There has never been any indication of legionella present,” she added. “We continue to co-operate fully with the relevant authorities.”
Another of the suspect sites, the North British Distillery, has been served a legal improvement notice by the HSE. It has been given until 29 June to rectify alleged failings in the measures used to kill legionella in one of its cooling towers.
The distillery, which is 50% owned by the whisky giant, Diageo, reacted by voluntarily closing all three of its cooling towers as a precaution, and shutting down production. It said, however that the flaws alleged by the HSE did not mean that the company was responsible for the Legionnaires’ outbreak.
The HSE also stressed that the action taken against the distillery did not mean it was to blame. “The source of the outbreak may never be conclusively identified, based on our experience from previous outbreaks,” said an HSE spokeswoman.
The HSE has also inspected the Burtons Food factory at Sighthill. A sixth site, Aegon insurance company in South Gyle, has been inspected by environmental health officers from the City of Edinburgh Council.
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