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By Todd Zwillich
WASHINGTON, Mar 14 (Reuters Health) - Children exposed to lead in their homes may still suffer toxic effects, even at levels once thought too low to cause harm, according to research released Thursday.
In the study of 4,800 children and adolescents, those youngsters with blood lead concentrations as low as 5 micrograms per deciliter (ug/dl) of blood had learning problems. Children in the study experienced an average 1% drop in reading scores for every 1 ug/dl rise in blood lead levels.
"Until the last decade, we couldn't find children with levels low enough to study them in this way. This is the largest study of its kind," said Dr. Bruce Lanphear, an associate professor of pediatrics at Children's Hospital Medical Center in Cincinnati and the study's author. The study was released at a news briefing here sponsored by the Alliance to End Childhood Lead Poisoning (AECLP) and the American Public Health Association.
Most lead poisoning occurs because children ingest chips or dust from lead-based paint. Though federal law now strictly limits lead levels in residential interior paint, millions of American homes are believed to still have surfaces painted with older, more dangerous paint.
Lanphear and other experts want to use the new data to head off the complacency they fear could arise after the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC) releases a report later on this month. The report is widely expected to show that average blood lead levels continue to fall among the nation's children. But even at lower levels of exposure, Lanphear and his colleagues warn, a real danger remains for over 1 million American children living in low-income housing with lead paint on the walls.
"The new (CDC) data reflect only part of the reality of childhood lead exposure," said Dr. Bailus Walker, chairman of the AECLP. Prior studies have shown that children in low-income families are eight times more likely to have dangerous blood lead levels than kids in higher income groups.
African-Americans risk of lead exposure is five times that of whites, said Walker, a professor of environmental medicine at Howard University in Washington, DC.
The 2001 federal budget provides $135 million to the CDC and to the Department of Housing and Urban Development for lead screening and lead paint removal from homes. Experts argued that the money is far too little to encourage building contractors, renovators and home-owners to make preventing lead poisoning a priority.
"We need to have not this small yearly appropriation, but a 5-year plan," said Mohammad Ahkter, AECLP's executive director.
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