U.S. Embassy in Italy: Naples Stinks!

Travel Blog • Michael Yessis • 07.13.07 | 7:17 AM ET

There’s some serious trash talk going on in Italy. The U.S. Embassy issued a warning earlier this week urging Americans to avoid Naples and its suburbs because they “may encounter mounds of garbage, open fires with potentially toxic fumes, and/or sporadic public demonstrations by local residents attempting to block access to dumps.” Naples, it turns out, is in the midst of a garbage crisis. Trash service has been disrupted since May, according to reports. Dumpsters are overflowing, and those that aren’t are allegedly controlled by the camorra, the Neapolitan mafia. And doing business with the camorra will cost you some euros.

According to Reuters, the European Commission has already taken “legal action against Italy over the thousands of tonnes of uncollected waste, saying it posed serious health and environmental risks through the spread of disease and through pollution of air, water and land.” A Stars and Stripes story, though, says “Italian health officials reported they have detected no outbreaks of infectious disease related to the garbage crisis, and are disinfecting areas where garbage has piled up.”

The news out of Naples offers a twist on the other trash news coming out of Italy in recent months. Often, the garbage on Italian streets comes from grubby, thoughtless tourists.