The Institute for Public Health of the Federation of Bosnia and Herzegovina (FBiH) again did not provide answers to key questions about bottled water in which bacteria were found that are not allowed. After their statement, doubts deepened further.
They did not say who is the manufacturer of the bottled water in which bacteria were found that should not have been there, including Escherichia coli, pseudomonas and streptococcus. They believe that they are not competent to publish this information, because their “authorities end with the delivery of monitoring results to the competent administration for inspection affairs”. That inspection authority is the Federal Administration for Inspection Affairs (FUZIP), from which they previously announced that they are not authorized to publish this information, but that the person who did the water monitoring – the FBiH Institute of Public Health – is responsible for that. On what basis the Institute is not competent to publish this information that it has come up with on its own?
They did not say how they concluded that “the pollution found was not in an amount that would be harmful to health”. In the statement of the Institute for Public Health of the FBiH, there was no data on the individual amount of each bacteria in each of the seven disputed samples of bottled water.
They did not say whether it is true that the samples were taken in the area of Istocno Sarajevo and Brcko District, that is, in a part of the country where FBiH institutions do not have jurisdiction. This allegation has not been confirmed or denied, except for the fact that the samples were taken in the territory of FBiH.
They did not say whether the disputed bottled waters were withdrawn from the market or not, that is, the allegation that they were not withdrawn from the market was not denied, although they initially claimed that they were. In this institution, they only pointed out that on October 18th they informed FUZIP in order to carry out “enhanced supervision in retail, production plants, and bottling plants”.
The described behavior of this institution leads to a well-founded suspicion that several criminal acts have been committed as information important for public health is being withheld and citizens are thus potentially put in danger. Furthermore, considering the lack of trust among the public, producers whose bottled water is not disputed are put in an unenviable position, Klix.ba reports.
E.Dz.
