EDITORIAL: Protecting children from lead poisoning a worthy goal

Keene Sentinel - 4/9/2017

April 09--Lead is a very useful element, but is poisonous to the human body. The Centers for Disease Control and Prevention notes lead toxicity can affect every organ system. Its effects are felt on a molecular level, involving fundamental biochemical processes. The CDC says the nervous system is most sensitive to lead exposure.

It is particularly harmful to children, whose brain development can be severely curtailed. There is no minimum safe level of exposure to lead for children, and any damage is permanent.

"There are thousands of children in this state living with lifelong afflictions related to lead," notes Keith Thibault, c hief development officer of Southwestern Community Services. "And hundreds more are poisoned every year."

Thibault's agency builds and renovates housing for the elderly and low-income families. It also runs local Head Start programs for children and oversees the area's Women, Infants and Children nutritional and health program. So he's familiar with both the extent of lead in the region and its effects on children.

Exposure can come in two ways: through contact with lead-based paint or by ingesting water tainted by leaching from corroded lead pipes or solder used to connect joints. What these have in common is they occur most often in older homes, particularly poorly cared for buildings, such as tenements. Thus, lead poisoning affects poor children disproportionately.

Perhaps that explains the widespread support for Senate Bill 247, which Thibault helped construct. It would strengthen testing of children for lead, ensure schools and day care centers are safer and set up a fund to aid in remediation efforts for sources of lead exposure. The bill was passed by a convincing 15-7 vote in the Senate last month and now heads to the House.

That's not to say there's no opposition to the measure. Some comes from fiscal conservatives who blanch at the $6 million fund it would set up to help fix sources of lead. Once that amount -- $3 million in both 2018 and 2019 -- is set up, future funding would need to come from elsewhere, perhaps federal grants or donations. Senate Finance Committee members recommended tabling the bill for that reason, but the full Senate refused. It now heads to the House, where money could again become an issue.

The funding for remediation was added to the bill in the first place to overcome objections from property owners and landlords, who didn't want to be put on the hook for expensive work due to small levels of lead. They're now on board, Thibault says, largely because the Senate amended the bill so it won't reduce the level of lead that would trigger action.

Last year, the state lowered the "acceptable" level of lead from 20 micrograms per deciliter in blood to 10. SB 247 would have reduced it further, to 5 micrograms. That's the level at which the CDC recommends action, though that agency notes no amount of lead in children's blood is safe.

SB 247 is a good-faith effort to protect children from a real danger. It deserves support in the House and from the governor.

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