Children attending older California schools are in danger of exposure to lead-tainted water because drinking fountains and faucets have not been tested for unsafe levels of the toxic metal. Lead exposure is particularly dangerous for young kids, whose bodies are developing.
Assemblymember Chris Holden (D-Pasadena) is trying to fix that with a bill that would require the water fountains and faucets at public and private schools built before 2010 be tested every five years and cleaned up if tainted with lead. The legislation, sponsored by the nonprofit Environmental Working Group, is a sensible solution to a problem that has been vexing environmental health advocates for years.
California has enacted several laws since the 1970s to limit lead exposure from products such as paint, pipes and plumbing materials. Drinking fountains in older schools are of particular concern because children, whose bodies can absorb more lead than adults, are most susceptible to the health hazards of the metal.
Though a 2017 law required schools built before 2010 to test their water sources for lead, it didn’t require schools to test all faucets and required remediation only if the water contained more than the federal standard of 15 parts per billion, which health experts have long disputed as unsafe. Even commercially bottled water has a maximum allowable lead level of 5 ppb. The results revealed that nearly 1 in 5 of the 8,200 schools required to test have a drinking fountain with water containing more than 5 ppb of lead.
There are no safe levels of lead in drinking water because even low levels can be dangerous, according to the Environmental Protection Agency, American Academy of Pediatrics and World Health Organization. Lead exposure can cause learning difficulties such as attention deficit disorder and hyperactivity, in addition to high blood pressure, reproductive problems and organ damage. Damage from lead poisoning is irreversible.
Holden’s bill would close the gaps in the…