Lead is poisoning children on U.S. military bases, says report

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Lead is poisoning children on U.S. military bases, says report
August 22, 2018 by Kevin Krajick, Columbia University
RE: https://phys.org/news/2018-08-poison...bases.html#jCp

A new report shows that family housing on some U.S military bases may potentially expose children to high levels of lead. Here, a house pictured on the Army’s Ft. Benning housing site. Credit: Columbia University

An extensive investigation by the Reuters news agency has found that many children living on U.S. military bases may be exposed to hazardous levels of lead in decaying family housing. The investigation included tests done at Columbia University's Lamont-Doherty Earth Observatory on samples of water, soil, and paint, from homes on seven bases. As a result of the report, a bipartisan group of four U.S. senators, in part citing the tests, has asked the Army for its own report on the problem, and immediate strategies to address it.

Reuters collaborated with Lamont last year in a separate report that cited high levels of lead in the soil of Brooklyn backyards and parks. After that, geochemist Alexander van Geen agreed to supply compact sampling kits for the military investigation. Reuters distributed the kits to selected families on bases in Georgia, Texas, Kentucky and New York. The families or reporters collected the samples and shipped them back to Lamont. Van Geen arranged for samples to be shipped back without return addresses so that he would be blind to their origins.

Analyses revealed no problems with water or soil, but the results on paint were alarming. At Georgia's Ft. Benning, exposed paint chips in reach of children in from five homes all held hazardous levels of lead–in one case, 58 times the permissible limit. At New York's West Point, chips falling from one family's front door was 19 times the federal safety limit. At Kentucky's Ft. Knox, paint peeling off a covered porch where children played was 100 times the threshold.

"The paint results were a big surprise–I didn't think it would be that bad," said van Geen.

Through Freedom of Information requests, reporters Joshua Schneyer and Andrea Januta also uncovered documents showing that blood tests on more than 1,100 children on six bases in recent years have shown they carried high levels of lead. In some cases, the Army failed to report the tests to state authorities, as required by law. The report detailed the story of one boy who was apparently poisoned by lead at Ft. Benning at age two; now at eight, he is still suffering developmental problems. Reuters estimated that some 100,000 children under the age of 5 live on military bases nationwide, but there is no way to know the total number who have been exposed to lead or suffered its effects.

The report says that the Army and private contractors, who maintain much of the on-base housing, have already started taking action in some places, overhauling medical reporting procedures, and undertaking a lead-abatement program on at least one base. But van Geen was taken aback by the initial reaction at one base. After Ft. Benning's commander heard that hazards had been found there, but before the report's publication, he wrote a letter to residents that "unknown persons" were seeking to test homes, and advised them not to cooperate. "I didn't think the military would respond so callously," said van Geen.

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Explore further: HUD proposes lowering acceptable lead level for children
RE: https://medicalxpress.com/news/2016-...-children.html

The nation's top housing official is proposing lowering the level of lead that must be detected in children's blood before triggering federal action to clean up the homes where they live.

U.S. Department of Housing and Urban Development Secretary Julian Castro made the announcement Wednesday after touring Providence homes where lead paint hazards have been cleaned up using federal funds.

The proposal would reduce the level that triggers intervention from 20 micrograms per deciliter of blood to 5.

Castro said the revisions will "allow us to act more quickly to make certain the homes we support are as safe as possible. The rule would also require a full environmental investigation rather than just a basic lead assessment, allowing us to more effectively locate and remediate the source of lead exposure."

Castro said that after a 60-day public comment period, the proposed change could affect about 2.9 million subsidized and public housing units built before the country's 1978 ban on residential lead paint. Any time there is a child under 6 years old living in HUD-assisted housing and found to have elevated lead blood levels above the threshold, the housing provider must report the case so HUD can launch an environmental investigation. If lead paint or soil is found to be the culprit, the hazards must be fixed.

The revisions would align HUD limits with recommendations made in 2012 by the U.S. Centers for Disease Control and Prevention.

Castro chose to make the announcement in Rhode Island because of the prevalence of lead paint-based contamination in the state's old urban housing stock and a yearslong state effort to track and reduce childhood lead poisoning.

The state has the fourth-oldest housing stock and the oldest rental housing stock, said Barbara Fields, executive director of Rhode Island Housing, a public agency. The state's health department says the number of lead-poisoned children has declined by about a third over the past decade, but 935 children in the state will be entering kindergarten this year with elevated levels of lead in their blood, which can cause irreversible health, learning and behavioral problems.

Advocates have pushed for the federal change, and Castro said in an interview that his agency has been considering it for some time.

"HUD has been aware that the standard ought to change," Castro said. "We started advising our grantees they ought to use the (CDC) standard. ... Now we're making it official that it's required."

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No amount of lead is safe for kids
RE: https://medicalxpress.com/news/2016-...safe-kids.html

No amount of lead exposure is safe for children, and stricter regulations are needed to protect youngsters from this serious health threat, the American Academy of Pediatrics (AAP) says.


There's growing evidence that even low levels of lead exposure previously considered safe can cause permanent mental, behavioral and school problems in children, according to the pediatricians' group.

Identifying and eliminating lead sources before exposure occurs is the only reliable way to protect children from this danger, the AAP said. This requires stricter regulations, more federal resources and joint action by government officials and doctors, according to the updated AAP recommendations.

"We now know that there is no safe level of blood lead concentration for children, and the best 'treatment' for lead poisoning is to prevent any exposure before it happens," Dr. Jennifer Lowry said in an academy news release. She is chair of the AAP Council on Environmental Health and an author of the policy statement.

"Most existing lead standards fail to protect children. They provide only an illusion of safety. Instead, we need to expand the funding and technical guidance for local and state governments to remove lead hazards from children's homes, and we need federal standards that will truly protect children," Lowry said.

The AAP added that new federal standards defining and testing for lead hazards in house dust, water and soil are needed. The group also wants to see laws that require removal of lead from contaminated housing and child care facilities, and that lead concentrations in water from school water fountains are not higher than 1 part per billion.

Until recently, children were considered to have a blood lead "level of concern" if they had a concentration of 10 or more micrograms per deciliter of blood. But evidence now suggests that problems begin at levels less than half that amount. Those problems can include lower IQ scores, poorer school performance, inattention, impulsivity, aggression and hyperactivity, the AAP said.

Protecting children from lead would save billions of dollars yearly in costs associated with lead exposure, the AAP said. For example, every $1 invested to reduce lead hazards in housing units would save society $17 to $221. The AAP said that benefit is comparable to that of childhood vaccines.

Even though lead is no longer used in gasoline, paint and many other consumer products, many sources of lead exposure still remain. For example, about 37 million U.S. homes have lead-based paint, according to the doctors' group. The AAP said other sources include contaminated soil and water, and certain toys, hobby materials, dishware, vinyl mini-blinds and other items.

Pediatricians and other primary care providers should screen children for elevated lead levels if they are between 1 to 2 years of age and live in areas where 25 percent or more of housing was built before 1960, the AAP recommended.

The AAP also advises monitoring of children with blood lead concentrations of more than 5 micrograms per deciliter.