150 hit by carbon monoxide poisoning

ABOUT 150 people have been treated for carbon monoxide poisoning in two separate incidents in the north-east this weekend.

Sunday mass at a church in Angres in the Pas-de-Calais had to be called off after 80 people in the congregation complained of headaches and nausea.

According to the local préfecture, the incident was the result of a faulty gas heating system in the church. Four people are in hospital in a "serious" condition.

A carbon monoxide leak also affected 65 people attending a Saturday evening party in the salle des fêtes in Kaltenhouse in the Bas-Rhin.

Some 37 of them had to be taken to hospital, including four pregnant women and two children.

Every year about 4,000 people are treated for carbon monoxide poisoning in France, about two thirds of whom need hospital treatment.

Nine people have died from breathing in the noxious, odourless gas since the beginning of 2009.