Lead pipes may carry water to as many as 900,000 NYC homes, more than 60 years after such pipes were banned across the five boroughs. Lead can cause permanent brain damage and other developmental problems in children if consumed.
New York City outlawed new installations of lead service lines — the pipes that carry water from central mains to individual buildings — in 1961. But many of the predating lead service lines are still underground, and because so much time has passed, it’s unclear exactly how many remain.
The report found about 40% of citywide service lines include some lead pipe. Those service lines provide water to an estimated 1.8 million people, or more than 20% of the city's population. Staten Island had a below-average proportion of lead service lines at the borough level, but its Port Richmond neighborhood, situated on its North Shore, had the largest share by far of lead service lines: an estimated 61% of its pipes are either believed or confirmed to contain lead. East Harlem, Coney Island in Brooklyn and Jamaica in Queens also ranked high on the list of neighborhoods most plagued by lead service lines.
Rosner noted that Black and Latino New Yorkers are more likely than their white peers to be exposed to lead. Black, Latino and Asian children make up more than 80% of those whose blood lead levels exceeded the health department’s threshold in 2021, according tocollected by the agency. New Yorkers living in poverty are also more likely to suffer from lead poisoning, the data shows.
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