Public healthToxic lead can stay in the body for years after exposure
The ongoing water crisis in Flint, Michigan has highlighted just how harmful lead contamination is. What you may not realize, however, is that lead exposure is a problem throughout the United States. The Centers for Disease Control and Prevention estimates that over four million households with children in the United States are exposed to elevated levels of lead. At least half a million children have blood lead levels above five micrograms per deciliter, the threshold that prompts a public health response. Because lead causes irreversible damage, making sure that people are not exposed to lead is especially important. Lead exposure in the United States has been minimized by two government actions – in 1973 and 1977 — but there is still plenty of lead out there. And those who are poor or live in the shadow of abandoned industrial sites are often at greatest risk.
Professor Stuart Shalat // Source: gsu.edu
The ongoing water crisis in Flint, Michigan has highlighted just how harmful lead contamination is. What you may not realize, however, is that lead exposure is a problem throughout the United States.
The Centers for Disease Control and Prevention estimates that over four million households with children in the United States are exposed to elevated levels of lead. At least half a million children have blood lead levels above five micrograms per deciliter, the threshold that prompts a public health response.
Lead used to be commonly used in gasoline, household paints and even coloring pigments in artificial turf through the end of the last century. And although today lead is no longer used in these products, there is still plenty of it out there. Lead does not break down in the home or the environment, and the result is that we still have to be concerned about lead poisoning today.
As a university-based researcher who focuses on children’s health, I have spent the past thirty years trying to understand how exposure to environmental toxins happens, and how to prevent it.
So where and how do people come into contact with lead, and what does it do to their bodies?
Lead in water is easily absorbed by the body
Lead is one of the oldest materials utilized for the construction of plumbing systems. In fact, the word “plumbing” even has its origins in the Latin word for lead, “Plumbium.” While Congress banned the use of lead pipes in 1986, with the passage of the Safe Drinking Water Act, the crisis in Flint illustrates that lead pipes are still out there.
