Not only is it Spooky Season, it’s also National Lead Poisoning Prevention Week!
To celebrate, the EPA has released an information kit “as a starting point for individuals, communities and tribal, state and local governments and organizations to develop customized messaging to meet the needs of different communities.”
The EPA has asked all members of the lead community to share this information with their followers. I am more than happy do to so, along with my two cents...
The theme of this year’s National Lead Poisoning Prevention Week is:
“Bright Futures Begin Lead Free.”
According to the information kit, “Bright Futures Begin Lead Free” when you share these key messages:
The EPA expounds on these key messages:
Get the Facts: Lead is still a problem in many communities. Learn about lead exposure, lead hazards, and how you can protect you and your family.
Get Your Child Tested: A blood test is the best way to find out if your child has lead poisoning. Talk to your child’s healthcare provider about getting a blood lead test if your child may have been exposed to lead.
Get Your Home Tested: Minimize your risk of lead exposure by hiring a certified professional to test your home for lead if it was built before 1978.
My take:
When it comes to knowing the facts, I would say it’s a fact that lead is still a problem for everyone, in all communities. Even if a child lives in a newer home, it is still plausible they could be exposed to lead at a friend or relatives house, the park, daycare or school, from food, or from one of the thousands of lead-contaminated products that are being sold in stores across America every day, including ceramics, kitchenware, toys, furniture, and even clothing.
Getting your Child Tested for lead is definitely a good idea, but it should NOT be the starting point. The negative effects of lead are irreversible—once lead particles enter the blood and pass through the blood brain barrier, the damage is irrevocable. This is why I urge parents to “test with kits, not kids”. Imagine this scenario: a child is screened for lead at their one-year checkup and the results are low—no lead was detected. The parents see the results and think “phew, our house has no lead in it, great!”. The next week, the child picks a piece of chipping paint off a door and eats it. This child is now lead poisoned, and literally no one will know until their next yearly lead screening.
Testing your home is essential, and really should be number one on this list of EPA's “key messages”. If you know there is lead in your home, you can deal with it BEFORE your child is harmed. The EPA recommends that families hire a professional to test their home for lead, in the same breath they state that lower-income families represent the highest instances of childhood lead poisoning (nearly two-thirds of all lead-poisoned children). Low-income families cannot afford a professional home lead examination. This is a complicated issue, but there is certainly a chicken-and-egg scenario occurring here, where lower-income families do not have to the access to the resources required to make their homes lead-safe, resulting in children with elevated lead levels. And the EPA’s suggestion is to do the things that are prohibitive to them in the first place.
We need the EPA to recognize and promote an accessible, user-friendly, and cost-effective method for detecting lead and reducing exposure, like FluoroSpec.
But I digress…
The info sheet also contains lots of useful and accurate lead information, such as:
Lead Poisoning is Preventable!
Lead is Toxic, Especially to Young Children
Children younger than 6 years of age are particularly vulnerable to lead exposure
3.3 million American households with children under 6 have lead exposure hazards
Lead can be found inside and outside the home*
In addition to:
Lead exposure can happen during renovation, repair, or painting a pre-1978 home
Lead may also be found in drinking water
Lead naturally occurs in soil
Lead can also be present in playgrounds
Lead may be in items made in other countries
*The bullet point, Lead can be found inside and outside the home, is followed by a blurb about lead-based paint, beginning with the statement, “A common source of lead exposure is cracked or chipped lead-based paint…”.
So, let’s talk about lead-based paint. We all know it’s a common source of lead exposure, but what exactly is “lead-based” paint?
Lead-based paint is paint that is comprised of at least 1% lead by weight, a threshold established by the U.S. Department of Housing and Urban Development (HUD) and the EPA. This threshold significantly reduced the amount of lead in residential paint, as part of the Lead-Based Paint Poisoning Prevention Act of 1971, but comes with its own set of issues, as only paints that exceed this threshold are regulated. Many older paints contain lead at levels below this threshold—low-lead paint (paint with lead levels less than 1%) was regularly produced and used in residences long after the lead-based paint ban of 1971. Though these low-lead paints do not exceed the regulatory threshold for lead, they can still pose a risk for lead exposure. If a child is exposed to deteriorating paint that contains lead, whether at low levels or not, they can still ingest lead dust or paint chips, which can lead to lead poisoning. Alarmingly, residential paint wasn’t completely lead free until the late 1990s.
Under the Residential Lead-Based Paint Hazard Reduction Act of 1992, sellers and landlords must disclose known lead-based paint hazards to potential buyers or tenants. Unfortunately, there is currently no disclosure requirement for low-lead paint in residences, even though it can cause harm.
The info packet goes on to list a lot more good information about lead; how it enters the body lead (breathing, accidental ingestion), common sources of lead in our water supply (lead pipes, faucets, and fixtures), etc.
The focus then shifts to blood lead tests.
I have been wanting to cover blood tests more in-depth for a while, and while this is a topic that certainly deserves its own blog post, I’d love to touch on it briefly:
The EPA’s Information Sheet provides the following information about blood lead tests:
A blood test is the best way to find out if your child has lead poisoning.
Blood tests are required for:
-Children at 12 to 24 months enrolled in Medicaid, or children between 24 and 72 months with no record of previous blood lead test.
Blood Tests are Recommended for the following groups:
-Children at 12 and 24 months living in areas that are higher risk
-Children or other family members who have been exposed to lead
-Children who should be tested under their state or local testing plan
The info sheet provides a link to the recommended actions, based CDC’s Blood Lead Reference Level of 3.5 micrograms per deciliter.
“The blood lead reference value is the level at which a child has more lead in their blood than most U.S. children (97.5% of children ages 1-5 years).”
The issue with this level is that it isn’t based on health or safety, but on blood lead level population trends. In other words, a child’s blood lead level is not considered “elevated” until it is in the highest 2.5 percent of blood lead levels in the entire country. Current research demonstrates the negative and irreversible effects of low blood lead levels in children (as low as 3 micrograms per deciliter), yet such levels can read as “negative” on a child’s blood lead test. Many pediatricians’ in-office tests can’t even detect blood lead levels below 3.3 micrograms per deciliter, meaning a child can have a blood lead level of 3.2 and the test will show no detectable level of lead in their blood. This is misleading to parents, and again, can easily create a scenario in which a family can be totally unaware of a lead hazard in their child’s environment.
The last section of the Information Kit centers around Community Outreach.
The Information Kit encourages people to raise awareness in their communities to empower families to take action to reduce lead exposure, and lists the three steps to engage your community this National Lead Poisoning Prevention Week:
Step 1.Form a committee. Step 2. Develop an action plan. Step 3. Get organized.
If I’m being completely honest, this strategy fails to impress. Forming a committee seems like an unusual first step for anything, and getting organized feels like it should be much closer to the beginning? But I don’t want to quibble—the document does provide much more detailed information on how to carry out each step.
My biggest takeaway from this Information Kit, which is the EPA’s most significant contribution to National Lead Poisoning Prevention Week, is that the current protocol is lacking. There is significant room for improvement in the EPA’s approach to lead safety standards and public awareness. By advocating for stronger regulations, enhancing education initiatives, and promoting more accurate, accessible testing and affordable remediation practices, we can ensure a safer future for everyone.
Test with kits, not kids.
Read the EPA's National Lead Poisoning Prevention Week Information Kit for yourself:
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