Cadmium screening soon accessible and reimbursed?

→ Promised from June 2025 by the former Minister of Health, Yannick Neuder, the reimbursement of cadmium screening in city laboratories is now well underway. Recognized as a carcinogen, this heavy metal is found on our plate. In mid-March 2026, the analysis laboratories and Health Insurance reached an agreement on a price. This test, which consists of a blood test or a urine sample, will cost 27.50 euros, with 60% covered by Social Security and 40% by complementary health insurance. Already taken care of in hospital, it should therefore also be taken care of in private laboratories by the beginning of summer, once the decree is published in Official Journal .

→ Naturally present in the environment – in trace amounts – cadmium is also found in certain fertilizers used in conventional and organic agriculture, reinforcing its concentration in the soil. It is found on our plates: potatoes, chocolate, cereals, rice, pastries… For more than ten years, warnings have been coming one after the other and intensifying about its dangers, with overexposure carrying risks for the kidneys and bone tissue.

→ However, the reimbursement will not concern everyone. This will not involve widespread screening for the 69 million French people. According to François Blanchecotte, president of the Union of Biologists (SDBIO), it would first target people living in areas identified as the most contaminated. Like Burgundy, certain sectors of Drôme, Charente-Maritime or even Hauts-de-France, where the levels in the soil are among the highest, according to surveys from the Scientific Interest Group on soils. But these samples date back to 2011. Fifteen years later, the exhibition map has evolved.

→ Cadmium contamination of the French, however, no longer needs to be proven. The National Health Security Agency, in a March 2026 report, warned of “worrying impregnation at all ages”. Knowing that it takes between ten and thirty years to eliminate it from the body, what solutions exist? A bill recommending reducing the level of cadmium per kilo of fertilizer must be examined in the National Assembly on May 12, 2026.