Children living closest to the mines had the lowest literacy and numeracy scores. Katherine Clark/Flickr, CC BY-NC-ND

Children in mining and smelting towns who are exposed high levels of lead, arsenic and cadmium are more than twice as likely to have developmental disorders than the national average. They also perform lower than neighbouring peers on school tests, our research, published today in the journal Environmental Pollution, reveals.

Children living closest to Broken Hill’s lead and zinc mine who had the highest levels of exposure to toxic air, dust and soils consistently had the lowest literacy and numeracy scores in years three and five. We found similar results in Australia’s two other major lead mining and smelting cities: Mount Isa and Port Pirie.

Exposure to lead and other toxic metals during early childhood can harm the growing brain. Progress is now being made to reduce exposure in the three mining towns. But for children already exposed, the damage cannot be reversed.

Long-known harms

Broken Hill in western New South Wales, has been home to continuous lead mining since 1884. One of the first reports suggesting that ore extraction and processing (including smelting in the early days) caused poisoning was published in 1893.

A systematic, annual program of testing children’s blood lead showed a generally decreasing level between 1991 and 2009. However, after 2010 the trend was reversed. By 2014, one in five children exceeded the already too-high blood-lead goal of ten micrograms per decilitre (10 μg/dL). Levels above this value were investigated.

While some of the apparent rise in children with high blood levels may be due to greater participation in NSW Health’s annual monitoring, the result clearly reflects the persistence and pervasiveness of the environmental lead exposure problem in the city.

In May 2015, the National Health and Medical Research Council (NHMRC) lowered the childhood blood lead intervention level from ten to five micrograms per decilitre. This reflects the global view that there is no minimum safe level of exposure.

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Source: Australian children exposed to toxic mining metals do worse at school I The Conversation