Finally no trace of plague in suspicious mail received by a training center

The six people exposed to this black powder received in a training center were finally able to be deconfined: no trace of plague was finally noted after new tests.

The suspicious mail had been sent to a training center in Chalon-sur-Saône, which initially tested positive, the Saône-et-Loire prefecture said on Thursday. “To date, there is no longer any biological risk,” she specifies.

” Merry Christmas “

Initial analyzes revealed the presence of plague. Six “potential victims” were placed under medical surveillance, and a Lyon laboratory was seized to carry out additional analyses.

This powder ultimately looks more like a “harmless” black material, according to Commander Magali Perrin of the Mâcon police station, interviewed by AFP. The envelopes, posted in Slovakia, bore the inscription “Merry Christmas” written in the Cyrillic alphabet, she added. “What was the point of all this? We don’t know,” she commented. No judicial investigation has yet been opened.

Already a false positive this summer

In July, black powder found in mail at the Longvic sorting center, in Côte-d'Or, and addressed to the former Minister of the Interior Gérald Darmanin, also revealed slight traces of plague after initial analyses.

The powder had been the subject of additional tests, but this too was a “false positive”: “There was never a trace of plague,” recalled Magali Perrin.

No cases of plague have recently been reported in Europe, and in France, the last cases occurred in 1945, in Corsica, according to the Pasteur Institute.