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Vermont plans to include more children in lead poisoning awareness program



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By WILSON RING The Associated Press - Published: February 2, 2007

MONTPELIER — The state of Vermont plans to lower the threshold at which government gets involved when lead is found in the bloodstream of children, calling lead poisoning a pervasive problem that retards growth and contributes to a variety of health problems.

The change would increase from about 300 to about 3,000 the number of children in Vermont with what are considered to be dangerous levels of lead in their blood, Attorney General William Sorrell said Thursday.

"This is not an isolated health problem," Sorrel said. "This is pervasive across the state."

Lead is most prevalent in buildings built before 1978, when lead paint was banned, but it can also be found in other products, officials said. About 60 percent of lead poisoning occurs in rental housing, officials said.

Lead poisoning can reduce a child's IQ, cause problems with attention, motor skills, social behavior, immune system problems and, in girls, delayed puberty.

Exposure to even small amounts can reduce a child's IQ, said Dr. Bruce Lanphear, director of the Cincinnati Children's Environmental Health Center, who appeared with state officials at a news conference at which a report titled "Get the Lead Out" was released.

"There is no safe level of lead in blood," said Lanphear. "Moreover, at the lowest levels of exposure… we see dramatic reductions in the intellectual ability of children."

The National Centers for Disease Control has set a level of 10 micrograms per deciliter of blood as the point of concern. Children found with more than that are assigned a Health Department case worker in hopes of reducing their exposure to lead.

But the state is going to reduce that level to five micrograms per deciliter, becoming the first in the nation to do so, Sorrell said. Children found with lead levels between five and nine micrograms would get educational materials sent to their homes and be offered additional services. The owners of their homes, meanwhile, would be required to bring the buildings into compliance with Vermont's lead law.








READER COMMENTS


Thank you Government of Vermont for once again placing us on the cutting edge of stupidness. Parents of children with any trace of lead are now threatened by the state if they own their own older home and the older rentals will likely be pulled off the market. Warnings, it is said, will be sent out and to follow that thought its clear SRS will be the BIG GUN held against the parents head. SRS will most certainly remove a child from a "contaminated" home. Cant have kids with any trace of lead but kids can be molested for years and the perps walk with 60 days or a $22 dollar fine. Have you had YOUR lead levels checked Mr. Sorrell?
Colin Bridge
-- Posted by Colin Bridge on Sun, Feb 4, 2007, 12:53 pm EST

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The Centers for Disease Control and Prevention reported last December that levels of lead in children continue to decline. That’s a scary thought to the lead hysteria industry. This week the lead-heads launched an effort to “head off” any further good news about lead.

The Alliance to End Childhood Lead Poisoning sponsored a press conference to spotlight the upcoming publication of a new study by activist-researcher Dr. Bruce Lanphear of the Cincinnati Children’s Hospital Medical Center.

Though the study will not be published and available for review by the public for weeks, Dr. Lanphear announced he had linked learning problems in children to extremely low levels of lead exposure, on the order of 5 micrograms of lead per deciliter of blood (microg/dl) and below.

Dr. Lanphear shrilled, “Lead is a major cause of many diseases of industrialization... There is no safe level of exposure to lead... Each of us has been adversely affected by lead and will be adversely affected until the day we die.” Dr. Lanphear called for a total ban on the commercial use of lead.

But Lanphear’s alarmism comes across as a lead balloon.

There is no question that “lead poisoning” can be harmful. But what is “lead poisoning”? Physicians and the lead-heads disagree.

Medical treatment for “lead poisoning” is recommended for blood lead levels above 45 microg/dl, according to the American Academy of Pediatrics. Environmental intervention – such as cleaning and repairing a home with deteriorating lead paint – is recommended for blood lead levels over 25 microg/dl.

But such high blood lead levels are rare and are becoming more so.

The CDC reported last December a 28 percent drop (from 10.5 percent to 7.6 percent) in the number of children with blood lead levels above 10 microg/dl. The CDC reported a 20 percent drop (from 1.5 percent to 1.2 percent) in the number of children with blood lead levels above 20 microg/dl.

Up until 10 years ago, such numbers would be cause for celebration at CDC. But in 1991, the lead-heads convinced CDC to reduce the level of concern for blood lead levels from 25 microg/dl to 10 microg/dl – that’s where the lead controversy enters the junk science world.

Lead-heads claim low-level lead exposure is associated with lower IQ scores and behavior problems among children – a claim launched by a controversial 1979 New England Journal of Medicine study by University of Pittsburgh researcher Dr. Herbert Needleman.

Not everyone was impressed with Needleman’s work, though. Critics uncovered many problems. Needleman didn’t control for the confounding factor of child’s age. Factoring in age yielded few significant results. Needleman excluded from his analysis children who were “lead poisoned” but without impaired intelligence. Needleman omitted other results that didn’t support his conclusion.

Needleman was subsequently accused of scientific misconduct. Though he was ultimately not convicted of scientific misconduct, he wasn’t vindicated either.

As was pointed out in the New England Journal of Medicine, “...the investigative bodies found Needleman’s studies scientifically flawed... involving a ‘pattern of errors, omissions, contradictions and incomplete information...’ The University of Pittsburgh... stated that had Needleman accurately described his methodology and subject selection, he ‘would have risked rejection’ of his article by the New England Journal of Medicine. In addition, the [federal] Office of Research Integrity cited misplotted graph points, which were found ‘difficult to explain as honest error’...”

Subsequent studies, generally conducted by activist-researchers such as Lanphear, purport to support Needleman’s original claims. But the studies suffer from the same basic flaw: their weak statistical associations between blood lead levels and learning and behavior problems could easily be explained by socio-economic factors not adequately considered by the researchers.

After all, who’s surprised that poor, inner city kids underperform on cognitive tests?

Exposure to lead is not a problem for the vast majority of Americans and their children. More than $100 million is spent every year to monitor and reduce lead exposure among the populations most at risk for lead poisoning. The CDC data shows that progress is being made.

This progress is especially notable since commercial lead use has never been greater. Though lead is no longer used in U.S. gasoline and paints, lead has many other uses. Eighty percent of lead use is in automotive-type batteries. Leaded glass makes it possible to watch television and use computers safely.

Sadly, though, the lead-heads only see progress on lead exposure as a threat to their viability. They admitted as much during the press conference, stating that the purpose of Lanphear’s study was to prevent the CDC report from being interpreted “incorrectly.”

Ironically, the lower child blood lead levels go, the more shrill the lead-heads get. Lanphear noted that technology now enables the detection of lead in blood to the nanogram level – a billionth of a gram or one thousand times lower than the microgram level.

The lead-heads apparently plan to be around for a while.

Steven Milloy is a biostatistician, lawyer, adjunct scholar at the Cato Institute and publisher of JunkScience.com.
-- Posted by Colin Bridge on Sun, Feb 4, 2007, 12:15 pm EST

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