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 Box 12: Bathing waters in overseas territories with specific hazards  There are around 250 bathing waters monitored each year that are situated in European overseas territories. All these are French bathing waters and are located in the Caribbean Islands, French Guiana, Mayotte, and Reunion.

These bathing waters are often impacted by major weather or environmental events such as cyclones accompanied by heavy rains, or the massive beaching of Sargassum algae, a phenomenon that appeared in 2014 and seems to be lasting. These phenomena do not necessarily affect the bathing water quality but can impact the management of the water quality control. During the 2018 bathing season, two bathing waters were affected by the Irma cyclone and its consequences, while the Caribbean coastline faced the phenomenon of Sargassum algae bloom. The accumulation of these algae can have significant consequences on the environment and economy and can pose serious risk to bather’s health. Sargassum algae bloom impacted four bathing waters during 2018 bathing season. National authorities prohibited bathing during the event and did not performed sampling due to difficult access to the sites