Table Of ContentGETTINGTHE
LEAD OUT
The Complete Resource on
How to Prevent and Cope with
Lead Poisoning
GETTINGTHE
LEAD OUT
The Complete Resource on
How to Prevent and Cope with
Lead Poisoning
IRENE KESSEL
and
JOHN T. O'CONNOR
SPRINGER SCIENCE+BUSINESS MEDIA, LLC
Library of Congress CatalogIng-In-Publ1cat1on Data
Kessel, Irene.
Getting the lead out : the complete resource on how to prevent and
cope with lead polsoning / Irene Kessel and John T. O'Connor.
p. cm.
Includes bibliographica 1 references and index.
1. Lead poisonlng—Populär works. I. O'Connor, John T., 1954-
. II. Title.
[DNLM: 1. Lead Poisonlng—populär works. QV 292 K42g 1997]
RA1231.L4K47 1997
615.9'25688—dc21
DNLM/DLC
for Library of Congress 96-50951
CIP
ISBN 978-0-306-45526-1 ISBN 978-1-4899-6116-7 (eBook)
DOI 10.1007/978-1-4899-6116-7
© 1997 Irene Kessel and John T. O'Connor
Originally published by Plenum Press, New York in 1997
Softcover reprint of the hardcover Ist edition 1997
http://www.plenum.com
10 987654321
All rights reserved
No part of this book may be reproduced, stored in a retrieval System, or transmitted
in any form or by any means, electronic, mechanical, photocopying, microfilming,
recording, or otherwise, without written permission from the Publisher
For Our Children
Ou.r Po.si- Uses or Lea..J a..-e. 5101'
Drawing by Josh Caldwell, Age 12. Bowdon Elementary School, Carroll Co., Ga.
Foreword
Lead poisoning is one of the oldest diseases known to humankind, occurring from the time
humans learned to smelt and use lead, at least 5000 years ago. The disease was recognized
and described by ancient Egyptian and Greek physicians and was so widespread during the
Roman civilization that more than one scholar has suggested that it significantly weakened
that society and may have led to its downfall. During the medieval history of Europe, there
occurred outbreaks of lead "colic" (so named for the striking abdominal pain symptomatic of
adult lead poisoning) often in association with poor wine vintages, as lead was commonly used
in those times to "doctor" sour wine and restore a sweet taste. The practice was so common
and known to be detrimental to those who drank the wine that it was banned in the Holy
Roman Empire.
In colonial America, lead was known to cause disease in printers and rum distillers, and
was famous for causing "cider colic," a condition produced by drinking cider stored in pewter
vessels from which lead "leached" in large amounts. Benjamin Franklin spoke of it in his
correspondence with Dr. Benjamin Rush, a noted physician of the time.
Lead was first introduced as a pigment or paint early in the nineteenth century. Because
lead ore in the Midwestern United States was so pure, America soon became the lead supplier
to the world for this purpose, building a large and influential lead industry. By 1975, virtually
every new home built in the northeastern quadrant of the United States received a coat oflead
paint, which was really lead oxide suspended in linseed oil, known as "lead-in-oil." Pigments
VII
VIII GETTING THE LEAD OUT
were added, and this product became famous for providing durable, mildew-resistant sur
faces.
Because of the property of lead pigments to "chalk," and therefore provide an endlessly
renewable surface, they were also noted for the brightness of color they produced. Even today,
lead chromate is the constituent of the yellow paint that marks curbstones, fire hydrants, and
highway guidelines. Sadly, little did anyone realize at the time that, in addition to flaking and
peeling, the chalking of lead paint would produce deadly layers of lead chips and dust inside
painted homes.
Although the adult form of lead poisoning was already well known, the first cases of
childhood lead poisoning as we know it were described in 1897 by an Australian eye
physician by the name of Turner. He recognized a group of cases of optic neuritis (inflam
mation of the nerve that leads from the eye to the brain) in a group of children from
Queensland, Australia. Over the next decade, there appeared a flurry of scientific articles
confirming this observation, recognizing it as due to lead and attributing it to the habit of
chewing on porch railings from the verandas of Queensland homes! Thus, the entire pattern of
childhood lead poisoning was fully described and published by 1905.
Why then, you must certainly ask, was the use oflead paint not banned when its dangers
to children were now known? It was prohibited in Europe and Canada but not in the United
States. By 1918, sufficient reports had appeared in America and Europe to persuade authori
ties in Belgium, France, and Germany, as well as in Canada, to restrict the concentration of
lead paint to 5% lead by weight. This contrasted with American paint that sometimes
contained ten times that much! As a result, while the Europeans and Canadians have not
escaped unscathed, they have fared far better than us and our English counterparts who have
been slow to recognize this danger. Lead paint was not finally regulated in this country until
1970 in Massachusetts and 1978 nationally by the Consumer Product Safety Commission.
Application of this paint to American homes continued from 1875 until about 1950 when,
purely for economic reasons, the paint companies began to replace lead with titanium. Our
best available data tells us that as a result more than 60 million homes in the United States
contain potentially dangerous amounts of lead. The dilemma of reducing this danger lies
in the fact that lead paint is most hazardous when the surface is disrupted; yet we cannot
remove it without disrupting it. And, as the late Dr. Randolph Byers remarked to me over
lunch one day when we were struggling to have the Massachusetts Lead Poisoning Prevention
Act enacted into law, "Once you remove it, where are you going to put it?"
Ms. Kessel and Mr. O'Connor have done an admirable job of condensing into a relatively
short book a large amount of basic information about childhood lead poisoning. Interspersed
with case histories, they have outlined in a straightforward language the full dimensions of the
problem facing our country.
The remarkable fact that lead was removed from gasoline in 1978 had an unexpected but
substantial impact on average lead levels around the country. That, plus the efforts of
hundreds of thousands of concerned parents, health workers, housing advocates, and others
throughout our communities in forcing the government to attack the problem in all its forms
including toys, food, water, and industry has resulted in a significant reduction in the
frequency with which we now see this problem compared to in 1970. Then, fully 25% of the
preschool children living in the area surrounding Boston's Children Hospital had lead levels
Foreword IX
high enough to warrant treatment by the then criteria, which were twice as high as they are
today. The same was true or worse in many of the industrialized cities in the United States.
So we've come a long way but not far enough. Much remains to be done and the price of
any relaxation of safeguards will be the intellectual function of future generations. Our thanks
to Ms. Kessel and Mr. O'Connor for this effort. It all helps.
John W. Graef, M.D.
Chief Emeritus and Senior Consultant
Lead and Toxicology Program
Children's Hospital
and
Associate Clinical Professor of Pediatrics
Harvard Medical School
Boston, Massachusetts
Acknowledgments
We express our appreciation to the following individuals who reviewed and contributed to this
book:
James Bryson, Lead Paint Abatement Coordinator, U. S. Environmental Protection Agency,
Region I
Matthew Chachere, J.D., Northern Manhattan Improvement Corporation
Nick FaIT, Director, National Center for Lead Safe Housing
John Graef, M.D., Chief Emeritus of Lead and Toxicology Program, Children's Hospital,
Boston
Anne Guthrie, Deputy Director, Alliance To End Childhood Lead Poisoning
David Guthrie, Public Health Advisor, Lead Poisoning Prevention Branch, National Center
for Environmental Health, Centers for Disease Control and Prevention, U. S. Department
of Health and Human Services
Marco Kaltofen, P.E., Boston Chemical Data, Inc.
Marianna Koval, J.D., licensed lead-based paint inspector/risk assessor, Lead Safe Home,
Inc., Brooklyn
Neil Leifer, J.D., Thornton, Early and Naumes, Boston
Dennis Livingston, Community Resources, Inc., Baltimore
Catherine McVay Hughes, New York Public Interest Research Group (NPIRG)
Sandra Shaheen, Ph.D., Longwood Neuropsychology, Boston
Xl
