Lead is a ubiquitous toxic agent that is especially damaging to the young child and the developing fetus. Unlike many environmental health risks, the risks associated with lead are no longer theoretical but have been observed for many years. Indeed, the first regulation of lead in paint was enacted in the 1920s. Currently, because of growing evidence of lead toxicity at lower concentrations, the U.S. Centers for Disease Control and Prevention recently lowered its lead-exposure guideline to 10 ug/dl lead in blood from 25 ug/dl. Measuring Lead Exposure in Infants, Children, and Other Sensitive Populations addresses the public health concern about the logistics and feasibility of lead screening in infants and children at such low concentrations. This book will serve as the basis for all U.S. Public Health Service activities and for all state and local programs in monitoring lead.

Winner of the Arthur Viseltear Award for Outstanding Book in the History of Public Health from the American Public Health AssociationSelected by Choice Magazine as an Outstanding Academic Title During the twentieth century, lead poisoning killed thousands of workers and children in the United States. Thousands who survived lead poisoning were left physically crippled or were robbed of mental faculties and years of life. In Brush with Death, social historian Christian Warren offers the first comprehensive history of lead poisoning in the United States. Focusing on lead paint and leaded gasoline, Warren distinguishes three primary modes of exposure—occupational, pediatric, and environmental. This threefold perspective permits a nuanced exploration of the regulatory mechanisms, medical technologies, and epidemiological tools that arose in response to lead poisoning. Today, many children undergo aggressive "deleading" treatments when their blood-lead levels are well below the average blood-lead levels found in urban children in the 1950s. Warren links the repeated redefinition of lead poisoning to changing attitudes toward health, safety, and risk. The same changes that transformed the social construction of lead poisoning also transformed medicine and health care, giving rise to modern environmentalism and fundamentally altered jurisprudence.

Lead Poisoning discusses one of the most critical and preventable environmentally induced illnesses. The actual toll lead poisoning takes on society cannot be measured fully due to the "silent" nature of health effects, such as subtle intellectual deficits and neurological damage, caused by chronic low-level exposures. This book covers every major topic on the subject, including lead poisoning in children, sources of contamination, state-of-the-art sampling and analytical measurement methods, the newest studies on low-cost abatement methods, and much more. This reference is the most comprehensive presentation of issues currently available under one cover. The text is divided into three major parts. Part I provides insights from studies assessing lead exposures from paint, dust, soil, and lead battery recycling operations. The second part is a unique collection of strategic federal policy statements from the U.S. EPA, HUD, and HEW-CDC. It details the National Implementation Plan as well as a local government's efforts to provide low-cost effective risk communication and public outreach to the community. The next part offers seven chapters on analytical issues in the measurement of lead in blood, paint, dust, and soils. Part IV, Sampling Methods and Statistical Issues, rounds out the technical portion of the volume. The relationships among lead levels in biological and environmental media are investigated and the interpretive problems discussed. The use of multi-element analysis of environmental samples as an approach to investigate sources is described. The book finishes with its most unique feature-OPPT's Check Our Kids for Lead Program, one organization's effort to empower its employees to make a personal difference in confronting the problem of lead poisoning in children. The Program serves as a model for other government organizations (federal, state, and local), university and community organizations, and corporations to educate them and take personal and corporate responsibility for addressing this important and environmental health problem.