Did the removal of lead pipes increase life expectancy dramatically in the early 1900s??

[Guest guest]

They say that vaccines and better medical care has increased life

expectancy but I found a really interesting study suggesting that it was

large scale reduction in lead water pipes that had a big effect!

<<<Finally and most important in terms of motivation, the

early-twentieth-century United States

witnessed dramatic improvements in life expectancy, particularly for

urban-dwelling populations

(Haines 2001). It is widely accepted that most of these improvements

were driven by reductions in

infant mortality, which in turn, were promoted by better nutrition and

improved public health

services that protected infants and young children from infectious

diseases, particularly deaths from

infantile diarrhea.8 This paper suggests that the latter part of this

story needs to be revised:

reductions in environmental lead exposure appear to have also played a

significant role in promoting

healthier and more robust children, who were better able to withstand

the bacterial and viral insults

so common in early twentieth century American cities. Of studies that

look at infant mortality and

mortality transitions in the United States, Preston and Haines (1991) is

probably the best known and

most important. In their analysis of Census data from the turn of the

century, Preston and Haines

emphasize the importance of infectious diseases; they, like most

authorities, scarcely mention lead

poisoning as a cause of infant mortality (see, generally, Preston and

Haines 1991, pp. 3-48).>>

Source: http://www.princeton.edu/rpds/seminars/pdfs/troesken_leadpipes.pdf

Lead Water Pipes and Infant Mortality in Turn-of-the-Century Massachusetts*

Werner Troesken

Associate Professor

Department of History

University of Pittsburgh

Pittsburgh, PA 15260