The Future of Baltimore's Children and Lead.
First of all, everyone knows how bad the Baltimore School system is, everyone knows that the children are impossible to control. Because of this around half* are on some kind of medication for a learning/attention disability.
And anyone who watches the news in Maryland will tell you about once a year there's a story about how the schools' (and the surrounding neighborhoods) water supplies still carry dangerous levels of lead. Certainly they're turning off the fountain that had 655 parts per billion of lead (Having over 20 parts per billion is enough to have the water turned off) but that doesn't mean it wasn't drank from regularly and that a fountain that was untested doesn't carry the same amount - or more.
Have you ever linked these two things together - student behavior and lead levels? Before today I hadn't made a connection. I always wrote off behavior problems as a result of "broken homes". I never really thought there could be more at play.
Here's an excerpt from the Silverman & Fodera (attorneys) web site.
The greatest risk of injury from lead poisoning is to children under the age of seven, whose developing bodies and brains are sensitive to even small amounts of lead, which can leave children with irreversible injury that does not appear until many years after the exposure to lead. The kinds of injuries lead causes in children include:
* learning disabilities
* brain damage (sometimes subtle)
* loss of IQ points and intellect
* academic failure [- this is just another way of stating everything else imo]
* neuropsychological deficits
* attention deficit disorder
* hyperactive behavior
* antisocial (criminal) behavior
* neurological problems
* encephalopathy (brain swelling)
* major organ failure
* coma
* death
These injuries can be life-threatening or can prevent a child from realizing his or her scholastic, vocational, and financial potential, or from becoming a self-sufficient adult. Studies have shown that lead poisoned children are more likely to drop out of high school and to live a lifetime of unemployment. Lead poisoning can take important abilities from a child.
The United States Centers for Disease Control and Prevention in Atlanta (CDC) has concluded that the risk of a child's suffering the above injuries begins when a child's blood-lead level rises to a mere 10 micrograms per deciliter of whole blood. And while lead poisoning is treatable in the sense that there are medical and environmental interventions that can prevent further lead ingestion and help a child to excrete the lead that has already been ingested, the damage that lead does in a child's body is not treatable: once any lead is ingested, the damage is done and is permanent.
We've been aware that lead is dangerous since 1900 yet we've used it since 1978 - and let's face it, the schools in most of Baltimore are too poor to have updates - as are the surrounding communities. We've done these people a huge disservice - as if life wasn't hard enough for them, it's just one more thing holding them back.
A girl I tutored with said something about them demolishing the area and rebuilding - which is really the only solution (it's cheaper to take everything down than completely fix piping). I felt bad, but had to point out that no one cares enough about these people to do anything about it - and even if they did that's a lot of money and a lot of people without a place to go. A damned situation that's just going to keep getting worse until someone steps in and really makes the changes or everyone's gone.
* these are the only facts I could find, and they're outdated - so I went up in my assumption based on what teachers have said.
---
In happier news:
It's my Mom's Birthday! :D
And anyone who watches the news in Maryland will tell you about once a year there's a story about how the schools' (and the surrounding neighborhoods) water supplies still carry dangerous levels of lead. Certainly they're turning off the fountain that had 655 parts per billion of lead (Having over 20 parts per billion is enough to have the water turned off) but that doesn't mean it wasn't drank from regularly and that a fountain that was untested doesn't carry the same amount - or more.
Have you ever linked these two things together - student behavior and lead levels? Before today I hadn't made a connection. I always wrote off behavior problems as a result of "broken homes". I never really thought there could be more at play.
Here's an excerpt from the Silverman & Fodera (attorneys) web site.
The greatest risk of injury from lead poisoning is to children under the age of seven, whose developing bodies and brains are sensitive to even small amounts of lead, which can leave children with irreversible injury that does not appear until many years after the exposure to lead. The kinds of injuries lead causes in children include:
* learning disabilities
* brain damage (sometimes subtle)
* loss of IQ points and intellect
* academic failure [- this is just another way of stating everything else imo]
* neuropsychological deficits
* attention deficit disorder
* hyperactive behavior
* antisocial (criminal) behavior
* neurological problems
* encephalopathy (brain swelling)
* major organ failure
* coma
* death
These injuries can be life-threatening or can prevent a child from realizing his or her scholastic, vocational, and financial potential, or from becoming a self-sufficient adult. Studies have shown that lead poisoned children are more likely to drop out of high school and to live a lifetime of unemployment. Lead poisoning can take important abilities from a child.
The United States Centers for Disease Control and Prevention in Atlanta (CDC) has concluded that the risk of a child's suffering the above injuries begins when a child's blood-lead level rises to a mere 10 micrograms per deciliter of whole blood. And while lead poisoning is treatable in the sense that there are medical and environmental interventions that can prevent further lead ingestion and help a child to excrete the lead that has already been ingested, the damage that lead does in a child's body is not treatable: once any lead is ingested, the damage is done and is permanent.
We've been aware that lead is dangerous since 1900 yet we've used it since 1978 - and let's face it, the schools in most of Baltimore are too poor to have updates - as are the surrounding communities. We've done these people a huge disservice - as if life wasn't hard enough for them, it's just one more thing holding them back.
A girl I tutored with said something about them demolishing the area and rebuilding - which is really the only solution (it's cheaper to take everything down than completely fix piping). I felt bad, but had to point out that no one cares enough about these people to do anything about it - and even if they did that's a lot of money and a lot of people without a place to go. A damned situation that's just going to keep getting worse until someone steps in and really makes the changes or everyone's gone.
* these are the only facts I could find, and they're outdated - so I went up in my assumption based on what teachers have said.
---
In happier news:
It's my Mom's Birthday! :D