Health agency covered up lead harm

[Guest guest]

http://www.salon.com/env/feature/2009/04/10/cdc_lead_report

Health agency covered up lead harm

The Centers for Disease Control and Prevention withheld evidence that

contaminated tap water caused lead poisoning in kids.

By Renner

Salon

April 10, 2009 | From 2001 to 2004, Washington, D.C., experienced what may have

been the worst lead contamination of city water on record. Tens of thousands of

homes had sky-high levels of lead at the tap, and in the worst cases, tap water

contained enough lead to be classified as hazardous waste. Not that the Centers

for Disease Control and Prevention, the government oversight agency for public

health, was worried.

A 2004 CDC report found that water contamination " might have contributed a small

increase in blood lead levels. " The study has been influential. School officials

in New York and Seattle have used the CDC report as justification for not

aggressively responding to high levels of lead in their water, and other cities

have cited the report to dispel concerns about lead in tap water.

But the results of thousands of blood tests that measured lead contamination in

children were missing from the report, potentially skewing the findings and

undermining public health. Further, the CDC discovered in 2007 that many young

children living in D.C. homes with lead pipes were poisoned by drinking water

and suffered ill effects. Parents wondered whether the water could have caused

speech and balance problems, difficulty with learning, and hyperactivity. Yet

the health agency did not publicize the new findings or alert public health

authorities in D.C. or other federal agencies that regulate lead, such as the

U.S. Environmental Protection Agency or Housing and Urban Development.

Enjoy this story?

Buzz up!

More

* Buzz up!

* Digg

* Facebook

* StumbleUpon

* Reddit

" This is a disaster of accountability from CDC's point of view, " says

Rosen, a pediatrician and national expert on lead poisoning at Montefiore

Medical Center in New York City. " This raises troubling questions about CDC's

complicity in passing on dubious data -- and further questions about why CDC did

not publicize the 2007 results more broadly. "

CDC scientists and press representatives did not respond to requests for an

explanation about why the results were not widely publicized. Hawkins,

director of the District Department of the Environment, in Washington, says he

became aware of the 2007 study only on April 2 this year, when Salon showed him

an abstract of the study. Scientists from other agencies, including EPA and HUD,

also say they were never told about the results. " CDC never told us, " says an

EPA scientist, " and they never asked our help or any other water expert's help

when they did their studies. That's a shame and a waste, because when it comes

to lead in water, you need engineers, chemists and health people to figure it

out. " The scientists requested anonymity because they were not authorized to

speak to the press.

Salon raised questions in 2006 about the influential 2004 CDC report of lead

contamination in the D.C. area. New scrutiny of CDC's work has been sparked by a

scientific study published in January that contradicts CDC's conclusion of

minimal harm. Environmental engineer Marc of Virginia Tech, and

pediatrician Dana Best of Children's National Medical Center in Washington, used

Best's data for children's blood-lead levels and found a jump in high-level

results among kids who were infants and toddlers from 2001 to 2004. The authors

conclude that hundreds, possibly thousands, of children were adversely affected.

and Best raised further health concerns about the 40,000 Washington

children who were either in the womb or using formula during the crisis, for

whom health effects are expected to be the most severe. These children (now 4 to

9 years old) are at particularly high risk for future health and behavioral

problems linked to the lead exposure.

In February, a D.C. resident filed a $200 million lawsuit against the D.C. water

company, claiming that lead-contaminated tap water poisoned his twin sons as

infants, causing them to have ongoing learning and behavioral problems. The D.C.

Inspector General is investigating the reasons behind the apparently conflicting

results of the two CDC reports.

http://www.salon.com/env/feature/2009/04/10/cdc_lead_report