LEAD POISONING IN CHILDREN
Symptoms: poor appetite, vomiting, constipation, irritability, slow development, aggressive behavior, seizures, personality changes, clumsiness, paleness, fatigue, weakness.
Home care
Discourage your child from putting nonfood objects into his or her mouth and swallowing them.
If your home was built before 1950, have the paint and plaster tested for lead content.
Watch for changes in your child’s behavior.
Precautions
- Check your home and yard for possible sources of lead.
- Scraping, sanding, and other tasks involved in remodeling an older building may release lead into the air. Such a location should be avoided by infants, small children, and pregnant women until the work is completed.
- A person who works in an occupation that involves exposure to lead should take steps to avoid bringing lead-containing dust into his or her home on work clothes.
- Sources of lead poisoning can include artist’s pigments, exhaust from cars, soil around buildings on which lead-based paint was used, city air, and improperly glazed pottery.
Lead is a heavy and dense metal that, in the human body, acts as a poison. Microscopic particles of lead can enter the body if a person swallows something that contains lead or inhales air contaminated with lead. The metal then accumulates in the blood and in body tissues. The most serious effects of lead poisoning are on the brain and nervous system. It can also damage the digestive system and the kidneys.
Before 1950, lead was an ingredient in paint, plaster, and putty, and most cases of lead poisoning occur when a small child eats fragments of lead-based paint that have peeled off a wall or have been left in the soil around a house. Today, house paint does not contain lead, but the metal is found in many other places. Some of the sources of lead poisoning include artist’s pigments, exhaust from cars (some petrol contains lead), soil around buildings that were once painted with lead-based paint, and the air in cities where lead may be used in industry and where the exhaust from many cars is concentrated. Also, lead is found in high-acid food and drinks (for example, orange or tomato juice) that have been stored in lead-containing pottery that was not properly glazed.
Lead poisoning can cause permanent damage to the brain, especially in cases where the symptoms are severe. Such damage may not occur if the problem is quickly identified and treated. However, a child who has had lead poisoning may take as long as a year to recover completely. Lead poisoning occurs most often in children under five. It is most dangerous if the child is under two years old.
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