Lead Levels in Preindustrial Humans

Ar, Flegal; Dr, Smith

doi:10.1056/nejm199205073261916

Cited by 84 publications

(4 citation statements)

References 10 publications

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Section: Natural Versus Baseline Lead Concentrations In Animalsmentioning

confidence: 99%

“…Natural PbB levels of humans and lab rats (Rattus norvegicus domestica) have, however, been estimated to be 0.016 μg/dL or approximately 2-orders of magnitude below the U.S. contemporary baseline level of 1−2 μg/dL. 41 That estimate was determined from analyses of rats raised in trace metal clean environments with lead concentrations approaching natural levels. These consisted of high-efficiency particulate air (HEPA)-filtered air (Class 1000) trace metal rooms of acidcleaned plastic, with high-purity (18.3 MΩ cm) water and lowlead food.…”

Section: Concentrations In Animalsmentioning

confidence: 99%

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Distinguishing between Natural and Industrial Lead in Consumer Products and Other Environmental Matrices

Flegal

Odigie

2020

J. Agric. Food Chem.

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California's Safe Drinking Water and Toxic Enforcement Act of 1986 (Proposition 65) was designed to protect the state's populace from exposures to toxic levels of chemicals in consumer products, including foods, by requiring businesses to warn the public about any of those hazards. There is, however, one qualification in the legislation, which is that warnings are not required if the source of that contamination is natural, as opposed to industrial. That qualification is especially problematic for lead because "natural" and "industrial" lead have a common origin and behave the same in the environment and industrial lead contamination has been pandemic for millennia. As a result of that historic and ongoing contamination, ambient lead levels in the biosphere may be orders of magnitude above natural levels, limiting comparisons of "natural" versus "industrial" lead concentrations in products. Further complicating those comparisons are reports of erroneously high measurements of lead concentrations in the biosphere as a result of sample contamination during collection, storage, and analysis. Some of those problems may be addressed with measurements of lead concentrations using rigorous trace metal clean techniques. These techniques often yield lead concentrations that are below the Act's maximum exposure in foods and non-foods of 0.5 μg/day, eliminating the need for a public alert. Those techniques have also been used to derive natural lead concentrations in a few organisms (marine fish, humans, rats, and dandelions), which range from 2-to 100-fold below ambient levels. However, extrapolating from those few determinations to establish natural lead levels in other organisms is complicated and often inappropriate. Complementary stable lead isotopic composition measurements have also been used to estimate the percent of natural and industrial lead in some consumer products, including foods, wine, and dietary supplements. These measurements, however, require the isotopic compositions of both the "natural" and "industrial" lead end members, which may be poorly defined. In addition, the global market has further complicated identification of the "industrial" lead end member, because lead contamination of foods can occur during production, harvesting, storage, shipping, processing, and packaging, which can happen in different locales within a country, different countries, and even different continents.

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Section: Natural Versus Baseline Lead Concentrations In Animalsmentioning

confidence: 99%

Section: Concentrations In Animalsmentioning

confidence: 99%

Distinguishing between Natural and Industrial Lead in Consumer Products and Other Environmental Matrices

Flegal

Odigie

2020

J. Agric. Food Chem.

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“…In developed nations, the average blood lead concentration in the general population currently approaches 1.5 μg/dl, which is close to the estimated blood lead concentration in preindustrial humans (2 μg/dl), only exposed to natural sources, as estimated by the Global Burden of Disease (GBD) Consortium [ 7 ]. However, linear regression analysis of blood lead on bone lead obtained pairwise from environmentally or occupationally exposed humans [ 8 , 9 ] revealed that the preindustrial blood lead concentration in humans might have been as low as 0.016 μg/dl. It is unclear how blood and bone samples collected in the early 1990s and extrapolation justify this extremely low blood lead level for individuals only exposed to lead from natural sources.…”

Section: Introductionmentioning

confidence: 99%

Public and occupational health risks related to lead exposure updated according to present-day blood lead levels

Yang

Hara

et al. 2022

Hypertens Res

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Lead is an environmental hazard that should be addressed worldwide. Over time, human lead exposure in the western world has decreased drastically to levels comparable to those among humans living in the preindustrial era, who were mainly exposed to natural sources of lead. To re-evaluate the potential health risks associated with present-day lead exposure, a two-pronged approach was applied. First, recently published population metrics describing the adverse health effects associated with lead exposure at the population level were critically assessed. Next, the key results of the Study for Promotion of Health in Recycling Lead (SPHERL; NCT02243904) were summarized and put in perspective with those of the published population metrics. To our knowledge, SPHERL is the first prospective study that accounted for interindividual variability between people with respect to their vulnerability to the toxic effects of lead exposure by assessing the participants’ health status before and after occupational lead exposure. The overall conclusion of this comprehensive review is that mainstream ideas about the public and occupational health risks related to lead exposure urgently need to be updated because a large portion of the available literature became obsolete given the sharp decrease in exposure levels over the past 40 years.

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“…After the case was settled, we initiated a study to determine the “natural” lead concentration in dandelions, which we present in this report. The study was made using trace metal clean techniques similar to those we employed in previous study to determine the “natural” blood lead level in preindustrial humans (0.016 μg/dL), which is approximately 2 orders of magnitude below the current geometric average value (1.2 μg/dL) of adults in the U.S.A . As the following analyses demonstrate, our estimate of the “natural” level of lead in dandelion leaves is also orders of magnitude below most reports of contemporary values in those and other plants.…”

Section: Introductionmentioning

confidence: 99%

Natural Lead Levels in Dandelions (Taraxacum officinale): A Weed, Folk Medicine, and Biomonitor

Odigie

Rojero

Hibdon

et al. 2018

Environ. Sci. Technol.

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The natural lead concentration of dandelion (Taraxacum officinale) leaves is estimated to be 0.2 μg/g (dry weight), or 1–3 orders of magnitude below most contemporary measurements of that value for dandelions and other plants. This estimate is based on analyses of lead concentrations of dandelions grown in a trace metal clean laboratory, with environmental lead concentrations approximating natural levels. The protocols used in this study paralleled those in our previous study that estimated the natural blood lead level in humans (0.016 μg/dL), which is also 1–3 orders of magnitude below most contemporary measurements. Analyses of the isotopic ratios (206Pb/207Pb:208Pb/207Pb) of the lead in the plants grown in the laboratory and greenhouse and those collected in the field, as well as the isotopic ratios of the soils the plants were grown in in the laboratory, indicate that anthropogenic lead makes up a substantial amount of labile lead in today’s environments. Consequently, this estimate of the natural lead level in dandelion leaves provides both a benchmark for comparison of lead concentrations in contemporary plants and yet another measure of persistent lead contamination in the biosphere.

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Lead Levels in Preindustrial Humans

Cited by 84 publications

References 10 publications

Distinguishing between Natural and Industrial Lead in Consumer Products and Other Environmental Matrices

Distinguishing between Natural and Industrial Lead in Consumer Products and Other Environmental Matrices

Public and occupational health risks related to lead exposure updated according to present-day blood lead levels

Natural Lead Levels in Dandelions (Taraxacum officinale): A Weed, Folk Medicine, and Biomonitor

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