  Utilizing a missing mass technique we investigate the pp --> ppX reaction
scanning beam energies in the range permitting to create a mass close to that
of the f0(980) and a0(980) scalar resonances, but still below the K^+K^-
threshold where they decay dominantly into pi pi and pi eta mesons,
respectively. Prior to the data analysis we introduce a notion of the close to
threshold total cross section for broad resonances.
  We estimated for the overlapping mesons a0 and f0 the total cross section to
be smaller than 430 nb at excess energy of Q = 5 MeV.
  The experiment have been performed at the Cooler Synchrotron COSY using the
COSY-11 facility.
