Blood lead levels in children under five are on the rise again despite decades of remediation efforts in a town built on one of Australia’s richest mines.
Add articles to your saved list and come back to them any time.Marcus Phillips is 12 months old and just beginning to explore the world around him. He picks at paint on windowsills. He smacks dust out of carpets. Outside, he flicks red desert dirt from side to side, scouring the backyard for unknown treasures.
“We get pretty revved up about it,” says Lavinia Henderson, who oversees child and family programs at Maari Ma Health Aboriginal Corporation. “Lead is in every single bit of , and it’s this extra work, extra stress, extra engagement, and we just don’t get the support.”arrives at his home in Broken Hill – 13 hours west of Sydney – alongside Maari Ma’s lead monitoring team.
Even at lower levels, lead can cause issues with a child’s cognition and motor function. As levels increase, the body’s ability to use vitamin D and make red blood cells can decrease. In extreme cases, high lead levels can cause severe anaemia, kidney damage and seizures. Blood lead levels dropped dramatically in the decade following the introduction of Broken Hill’s lead monitoring program in the mid ’90s. “It was considered probably second only to the success of fluoridation in water as a public health project,” says Cathy Dyer, who has also worked with Maari Ma on its lead response for decades.But progress has plateaued.
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