Dangerous Lead-Based Paint Common Around the World

This is the VOA Special English Development Report.

A new study shows that lead-based paint remains a worldwide threat to public health. Paint containing lead is a major cause of lead poisoning in children.

The heavy metal enters the body when children breathe the paint dust or fumes in the air. Or when babies put their mouth on painted surfaces or swallow pieces of paint.

Lead can damage the brain and the nervous system. It can decrease intelligence, create behavior problems and slow a child's growth.

Researchers tested new household enamel paints from twelve countries in Africa, Asia and South America. The paints were sold under different brand names. The study found that almost three-fourths of the brands had dangerously high levels of lead.

Scott Clark is a professor of environmental health at the University of Cincinnati College of Medicine in Ohio.

SCOTT CLARK: "Most of the paint brands that we looked at had at least one sample that was above ten thousand parts per million, which is over a hundred times the current U.S. standard."

The United States has restricted lead content in paint since nineteen seventy-eight. Until this past month, the safety standard for consumer paints was six hundred parts per million. But the Consumer Product Safety Commission has just lowered the limit to ninety parts per million.

The new study appears in the journal Environmental Research. The team found levels of lead as high as thirty-two thousand parts per million in tests on some paint samples from Ecuador.

Professor Clark's team also published a study in two thousand six. It found that the majority of new enamel paints from China, India and Malaysia contained lead at levels of at least five thousand parts per million.

Lead paint can be a danger not only to people in the country where it is made. Exports can spread the danger to other countries.

The professor says high quality paint can be produced without lead. He and his team are calling for a worldwide ban on lead-based paint. He says many parts of the world are doing too little to correct the problem of lead poisoning in children. He notes that research has found no safe level of lead.

Of course, lead paint is not the only cause of lead poisoning. Recently Chinese officials closed a manganese metal factory in Hunan province. More than one thousand children living nearby were reported to have high levels of lead in their blood. And in two thousand eight, seventeen people died in Senegal after lead exposure from a battery recycling center.

And that's the VOA Special English Development Report, written by June Simms. I'm Steve Ember.

这里是VOA慢速英语发展报道。

一项新的调查表明，在世界范围内，含铅油漆仍然威胁着公共健康。含铅油漆是导致儿童铅中毒的首要原因。

铅是一种重金属。当儿童呼吸到空气中的铅尘或气雾时，或者婴儿将嘴放在油漆过的物体表面或者吞食了油漆碎片的时候，铅就会进入儿童体内。

铅会损坏大脑和神经系统，使智力减弱，导致行动问题，减缓儿童生长发育。

研究人员测试了来自非洲，亚洲和南美12个国家新品种家用瓷釉油漆。这些油漆品牌各不相同。研究发现，几乎四分之三的品牌含铅量达到危险水平。

Scott Clark是俄亥俄州辛辛那提医科大学的环境卫生教授。

Scott Clark ：“我们所调查的油漆中，大部分品牌至少有一个样本的含铅量超过10000个ppm，是美国现行标准的100多倍。”

自1978年开始，美国限制油漆中的铅含量。直到过去的一个月，消费者油漆的安全标准是600个ppm。但是消费者产品安全委员会将限制降低到了90个ppm。

这项新的研究发表在《环境研究》期刊上。该研究小组发现，来自Ecuador的一些油漆样本中，铅含量高达32,000ppm。

Clark教授的研究小组在2006年也曾发表一篇调查结果。研究发现，来自中国，印度，马来西亚的大多数瓷釉油漆含铅量至少是5,000个ppm。

含铅油漆不仅会危害生产国的人们，出口和会将这种危险带到其他国家。

教授说，在无铅的情况下也可以制造高质量油漆。他和他的研究小组呼吁全世界范围内禁止含铅油漆。他说，世界上许多地区没有采取足够措施来处理儿童铅中毒的问题。他指出，研究没有发现铅的安全水平。

当然，含铅油漆不是铅中毒的唯一原因。最近，中国官方关闭了湖南省一家锰金属厂。据报道，住在该厂附近的1000多名儿童血液中含有高水平的铅。2008年，塞内加尔17人因暴露在电池再循环中心而死亡。