A new publication by Aimin Chen, MD, PhD, Vice Chair of Education and Professor of Epidemiology in the Department of Biostatistics, Epidemiology and Informatics, titled “Eliminating Disparities in Children’s Lead Exposure: An Unfinished Job,” examines the persistent racial and socioeconomic disparities in childhood lead exposure despite substantial declines in blood lead levels nationwide.
Children’s exposure to lead has continued to decline over the last decade, but examination of state-level lead data reveals children of color and children from low-wealth families still have elevated blood lead levels at disparately high rates. In the NHANES 2021-2023 data, the geometric mean blood lead levels in children at 1-5 years was 0.53 µg/dL, and the value was largely similar in non-Hispanic Black children (0.58 µg/dL) and non-Hispanic White children (0.51 µg/dL). This apparent elimination of racial disparity in blood lead levels at the national level, however, needs to be interpreted with precaution for local levels.
First, the NHANES data in this 2-year cycle only included 301 children aged 5 years or younger, with limited power to examine elevated blood lead levels. Second, most of the seven states that reported data on blood lead levels greater than or equal to 5 or 3.5 µg/dL (the previous and current reference level, respectively) among those tested in this age range found a higher percentage of elevated blood lead levels in children of color. Ongoing disparities in elevated blood lead levels did not disappear, at least for now, in local communities, and targeted prevention efforts are still needed.