1 in 3 children worldwide threatened by unacceptably high lead levels in blood\, finds study
By Rick Gladstone
Lead contamination has long been recognized as a health hazard, particularly for the young. But a new study asserts that the extent of the problem is far bigger than previously thought, with 1 in 3 children worldwide — about 800 million in all — threatened by unacceptably high lead levels in their blood.
The ubiquity of lead — in dust and fumes from smelters and fires, vehicle batteries, old peeling paint, old water pipes, electronics junkyards, and even cosmetics and lead-infused spices — represents an enormous and understated risk to the mental and physical development of a generation of children, according to the study, released late Wednesday.
The danger is particularly acute in poor and middle-income countries where industrial pollution safeguards are poorly enforced or nonexistent.
“The unequivocal conclusion of this research is that children around the world are being poisoned by lead on a massive and previously unrecognized scale,” said the study, a collaboration of UNICEF and Pure Earth, a nonprofit that seeks to help poor countries threatened by toxic pollutants.
The study also said that nearly 1 million adults a year die prematurely because of lead exposure.
The authors said they based their analysis and statistical conclusions on research compiled by U.N. agencies including the World Health Organization, as well as by numerous universities and nonprofit groups.
Their primary conclusion was that one-third of the world’s children, up to the age of 19, have blood lead levels at or exceeding 5 micrograms per deciliter, a threshold that both the WHO and the U.S. Centers for Disease Control and Prevention have determined is a cause for action.
A major contributor to lead poisoning is a surge in the recycling of lead in automotive batteries to satisfy soaring growth in the numbers of cars and trucks, particularly in the developing world, the study said. While lead recycling for batteries is heavily regulated in the United States, it is often done haphazardly in poor and middle-income countries.
Lead has been known as a potent neurotoxin for hundreds of years — Benjamin Franklin wrote of its harm in 1786 — but the most insidious effects have become clearer only in recent decades.
The exposure of children to lead is linked to reductions in IQ scores, shortened attention spans and potentially violent and criminal behaviour.