Title:
Dangerous Lead-Based Paint Common Around the World
Description: This is
a VOA Special English Technology Report.
See text below
Text:
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.
He said: "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 August,
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 that's the VOA Special English Development
Report.
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personally reviewed this video and found it appropriate for
the news section of English Global Group. This
is a Voice of America video which covers an interesting
topic in Special English. I would appreciate some feedback from both
students and teachers about this video. You can comment in
the window below using any of a number of different services
including Facebook, Yahoo, AOL, and Hotmail.
