Over 170 million of people born in the United States who were adults in 2015 were exposed to harmful levels of lead as children, according to a study published in the Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences on Monday, March 7, 2022.
The researchers looked only at lead exposure caused by leaded gasoline, the dominant form of lead exposure from the 1940s to the late 1980s, according to data from the U.S. Geological Survey.
Over 170 million U.S.-born people who were adults in 2015 were exposed to harmful levels of lead as children, a new study estimates.
In a paper published in the Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences on Monday, they estimated that half the U.S. adult population in 2015 had been exposed to lead levels surpassing five micrograms per deciliter — the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention threshold for harmful lead exposure at the time.
Previous research on the relationship between lead exposure and IQ found a similar impact, though over a shorter study period. »