Overview of Lead Poisoning
According to the Environmental Protection Agency, about one in six children in America have dangerously high levels of lead in their blood. You cannot see, taste or smell lead.
Until the discovery of its disastrous effects on health, lead was used in gasoline, pipes, paint and other common products. In 1978, the Consumer Product Safety Commission banned the manufacture and use of lead-based paint in residential housing. Unfortunately, the ban did not require removal of lead-based paint from surfaces previously coated with this dangerous neurotoxin. This means that dangerous lead paint remains in the millions of housing units that were painted with it before 1978. Lead is a problem until it is removed because it does not break down naturally. Since lead does not break down naturally, it can be present in your home's dust, paint or soil, or in your drinking water or your food until it is removed.
Today about 3 million tons of leaded paint remain in approximately 57 million occupied private housing units built prior to 1980. This represents approximately 74 percent of all such housing. The Agency for Toxic Substances and Disease Registry (ATSDR) has stated that corrective actions for these homes have been a complete failure. Children easily get lead poisoning "just by being kids." By crawling on the floor or wiping hands on contaminated walls or windowsills, children can become victims. The long-term effects of lead poisoning in children can be very severe.
Children can suffer learning disabilities, decreased growth, hyperactivity, impaired hearing and even brain damage. As in many other types of poisoning, the earlier that treatment is sought, the greater the possibility of reducing damage. Lead can pass through a pregnant woman's body to her baby, so it is very important to avoid lead exposure if you are pregnant.
What Every Parent Should Know About Lead Poisoning in Children
For children at risk for lead exposure, a simple blood test
can prevent a lifetime spoiled by the irreversible damage
caused by lead poisoning.
One of the most important risk factors for lead exposure is the age of housing.
Over 80 percent of all homes built before 1978 in the U.S. have lead-based
paint in them. The older the house, the more likely it is to contain lead-based
paint
and a higher concentration of lead in the paint.
According to recent CDC estimates, 890,000 U.S. children age 1-5 have elevated
blood lead levels, and more than one-fifth of African-American children living
in housing built before 1946 have elevated blood lead levels. These figures
reflect the major sources of lead exposure: deteriorated paint in older housing,
and
dust and soil that are contaminated with lead from old paint and from past
emissions of leaded gasoline.
Lead poisoning can cause learning disabilities, behavioral problems, and at
very high levels, seizures, coma and even death.
Children between 12 and 36 months of age have a lot of hand to mouth activity,
so if there is lead in their homes, they are more likely to take it in than
are older children.
Sources of Lead Poisoning
Children younger than four years of age are at the greatest
risk for lead poisoning and its harmful effects. Infants in this
age group have a tremendous amount of hand-to-mouth activity,
from playing on the floor to crawling and walking while holding
onto walls and windowsills and then putting their hands in their
mouths. When there is chipping and peeling lead paint in a child's
home, the tiny chips and leaded dust get on their hands and into
their mouths and the poisoning process begins. According to the
Centers for Disease Control (CDC), lead paint is the predominant
cause of childhood lead poisoning in the United States. No matter
what the lead paint industry, landlords and their insurance companies
say, it is not your fault.
Chipping and peeling paint are the most common and dangerous
sources of lead poisoning for preschool children. Lead from painted
surfaces can enter a child's body completely undetected. This
has been
proven in scientific studies and in everyday living, when parents,
doctors and health agencies have investigated the sources of
lead a child has access to and how they become lead poisoned.
Leaded paint naturally erodes to create a chalky dust and begins
to chip and flake away from painted surfaces. The deteriorated
leaded paint becomes part of the house dust and is inhaled by
young children. The simple act of a child breathing in a leaded
environment can begin the poisoning process. It is the reason
why property owners and those responsible for property management
and maintenance have a legal responsibility to keep their property
free of chipping and peeling paint.
In addition to paint, other lead sources in the home can endanger
young children. These include: the home's water supply, soil,
ceramic cookware, older cribs and toys.
Medical Effects of Lead Poisoning
Lead poisoning has been termed the "stealth disease" because
of the way it occurs and the devastating neurological damage
it causes in children at doses that do not cause outward physical
signs of poisoning. Poisoning occurs when children eat tiny paint
chips or inhale harmful leaded dust. Chalking lead paint creates
dust that settles on toys and other objects. The dust is ingested
by the young child in normal hand-to-mouth activity. Leaded house
dust that is inhaled even in the smallest amounts is just as
lethal as that which is ingested. One paint chip the size of
a thumbnail, ingested by a young child, can cause permanent brain
damage.
Dr. John Rosen, a pediatrician responsible for treating lead
poisoned children at Montefiore Medical Center in New York states: "Lead
at remarkably low concentrations has the unique capability of
robbing kids of such skills as reading, writing, concentration
and abstract thinking. The set of things that are required for
academic success and employment success can be lost forever,
and all of that comes at a remarkable societal cost."
Because there are no initial symptoms from lead poisoning, blood
lead levels are used to identify children with dangerous amounts
of lead. In October, 1991, concluding a lengthy study, the Centers
for Disease Control (CDC) redefined toxicity as blood lead levels
at or above 10 micrograms per deciliter, (ug/dL), the level at
which some adverse health effects have been observed. No lowest
threshold has been identified for the harmful effects of lead,
although some studies have suggested harmful effects at levels
even lower than 10 ug/dL.
Many experts believe that when a child's blood lead level exceeds
10 ug/dL, there is a high probability of permanent neurological
damage. Even at these relatively low blood levels, decreased
intelligence, short-term memory loss, reading under-achievement,
impairment of visual-motor function, loss of auditory memory,
poor perceptual integration, poor classroom behavior and impaired
reaction time occur in children.
Virtually every part of the body is affected by lead. Lead has
no biological value and competes with metals that are essential
to the body, such as zinc, iron and calcium. Lead interferes
with bone formation by blocking absorption of calcium. This affects
memory storage and the differentiation of cells in the nervous
system.
Lead's effect on the brain results in less ability to store
information and draw upon past information and less ability to
inhibit responses to environmental stimuli. Lead also attacks
the peripheral nervous system, which controls the muscles and
organs outside the brain. It causes a decrease in muscle strength
and at high doses, wrist-drop and foot-drop.
Lead accumulates in the kidneys, causing kidney disease, which
has far-reaching endocrinological effects. There is a major impact
on the enzymatic functions of the liver and on the immune system
function of the spleen. It causes anemia by interfering with
the synthesis of hemoglobin. Lead affects the reproductive functions
of both men and women by interference with enzymes that process
testosterone and other androgens. Lead is stored in the bone
matrix and can be passed on to an unborn child by a pregnant
mother.
Lead Poisoning Litigation
Toxic Personal Injury Lawyers can help families
of children who have experienced lead poisoning symptoms or who
have been exposed to lead-based products such as chipping lead
paint. We consult with pre-eminent medical and environmental
experts to best present our clients' cases.
Treatment for Lead Poisoning
The treatment for childhood lead poisoning, known as chelation,
historically often involved a painful hospital procedure of injections
that causes lead to be excreted in the urine. Recently oral chelation
drugs have been developed that can be administered without hospitalization.
Chelation procedures do not reverse damage already done to the
body and it is thought that lead deposited in the brain tissue
is not removed by this procedure. Further treatment requires
careful clinical and laboratory surveillance of the child to
ensure that there is not continued exposure.
Just as important in treatment of lead poisoning is removal
of the source of the lead. The removal process can be an extreme
danger in itself if the child is on the premises before removal
of all traces of lead is accomplished. The increased paint chips
and dust in the air and on the surface of floors, rugs, furnishings,
and other belongings during removal can result in re-exposure
and raise a child's blood lead level above the pre-chelation
level.
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