Experts predict health crisis due to collapse of Vale dam in Minas Gerais

A prestigious Brazilian research institute warned on Tuesday that the collapse of a dam and the resulting spill of mining waste could cause a long-term health crisis, like similar disasters have shown.

At least 134 dead as a result of the collapse of the press in Brumadinho, southeast of Brazil, on January 25th.

Fiocruz's health experts have detailed a wide range of diseases and health problems caused by similar disasters in neighboring localities. These include Dengue, yellow fever and diarrhea short term. Later, a greater incidence of hypertension, diabetes and cardiovascular complications.

The experts based their badessment on consequences of a similar disaster in 2015. The collapse of the Mariana dam, in the same state as Minas Gerais, is considered the most serious environmental disaster in the history of Brazil.

Meanwhile, justice

Superior Court of Justice released, as a precaution, five persons arrested on January 29 accused of falsifying documents on the safety of the dam that broke out in Brazil.

In the ruling, Judge Nefi Cordeiro, an investigator of the case, said that The two engineers of the German company Tüv Süd and the three employees of mining company Vale, owner of the dam, "have already testified in court".

The Court also pointed out that "Searches and searches were carried out" at the accused's home and it was not established that they could offer "any risk" to the company, according to a statement released Tuesday.

As well, all judges "emphasized the seriousness of the event and the social unrest caused by the tragedy"but they understood that" there is no adequate foundation for prisons ".

Four days after the disaster, the Brazilian authorities arrested the five men for allegedly modifying the technical safety control documents for the dam.

The German company Tüv Süd, based in Munich and established in several countries of the world, is a Regulatory Technical Safety in Industrial Facilities and confirmed having conducted a periodic review of the Vale Dam in July 2018 and a regular safety inspection in September.

The injunction granted Tuesday by the Court of Justice releases Tüv Süd engineers, Andre Jum Ybaduda and Makoto Namba; Vale's Executive Director, Rodrigo Artur Gomes de Melo; to the environmental manager of the mining company, Ricardo de Oliveira and geologist Cesar Augusto Paulino Grandchamp.

With information from AP and EFE