Exposure & Symptoms

Sources of Lead Exposure in Children
  • Auto battery storage casings
  • Bone meal or dolomite supplements
  • Bootleg whiskey
  • Ceramics
  • Certain inks
  • Drinking water
  • Dust and debris from older building renovation
  • Fishing tackle and decoy weights
  • Foreign cold medicines: Azarcon 93.5%, (also Rueda, Coral, Alarcon, Liga, Maria Luisa); Pay-loo-ah 90% lead with arsenic; Yogran Guggulu
  • Foreign cosmetics: Kohl, Surina
  • Heroin
  • Home smelting of lead shot and bullets
  • Household dust
  • Imported plastic mini blinds
  • Lead-based paint chips, interior and exterior paint (before 1977)
  • Leaded crystal
  • Leaded foil wine bottle caps
  • Leaded gasoline fumes
  • Leaded residue from tainted soil or air in some fruits and vegetables
  • Leaded soldering fumes
  • Old newsprint
  • Old window glaze
  • Playground soil
  • Soil from smelter area
  • Soil, especially in dense urban areas
  • Water boiled in leaded pots and pans
Common Symptoms
View the common symptoms of lead poisoning in adults and children:
Adults
  • Abdominal pain
  • Anemia
  • Depression
  • Fatigue
  • Gout
  • Heart failure
  • High blood pressure
  • Kidney failure
  • Reproductive problems
  • Wrist or foot weakness
Children
  • Anemia
  • Constipation
  • Decreased appetite
  • Diarrhea
  • Learning problems
  • Lowered I.Q.
  • Sleeplessness
  • Stomach ache
  • Tiredness
  • Vomiting
Testing
Who should be tested for possible lead poisoning:
  • Children who are anemic
  • Children with learning or behavioral problems
  • Children who have been treated with foreign folk-medicines that contain high lead content
  • Children who have a sibling, housemate or playmate being followed or treated for an elevated lead level
  • Children who live in or regularly visit a house with peeling or chipping paint built before 1960. This also includes day care, preschool, or the babysitter's house.
  • Children living with an adult whose job or hobby involves exposure to lead. Lead dust can be brought home on the adult's clothes and contaminate a child's environment
  • Children living near environmental sources of lead, such as battery manufacturing plants, lead smelters, battery-recycling plants, or other lead industries