LANSING – Too few children are being tested for lead poisoning in Lapeer County due to a lack of funding and education, health officials said.

Fewer than half of the children covered by Medicaid in the county were tested for lead poisoning in 2007.  Without early detection, children may suffer from irreversible learning disabilities, life-threatening illnesses, violent behavior and even death.

Lapeer County health officer Stephanie Mercer Simmons attributed the problem to the fact that the department must pay for lead poisoning tests and education from an increasingly meager budget.

“Overwhelmingly, the challenge is funding,” Simmons said.  “If the child’s not on Medicaid, we don’t get reimbursed for the lead test or for outreach programs to educate people.”

As of January, only 44 percent, or 160 children of a target population of 366, had been tested for lead poisoning in Lapeer County.

In neighboring Oakland County, the numbers are also grim.  Of children younger than 2 years on Medicaid, only 53 percent were tested in 2006, said Evelyn Reinke, a nursing supervisor at the Oakland County Health Division.

In 2005, lead poisoning was confirmed in 3,100 children in Michigan.

Simmons said the lack of funding hampers efforts to educate the public about the dangers of lead poisoning, ultimately threatening children.

Janet Olszewski, director of the Michigan Department of Community Health, said the urgency of testing needs to be brought to the public’s attention.

“Many people forget lead poisoning is pretty pervasive in our communities,” Olszewski said.  “The challenge is getting children in and getting them tested.”

Health care experts warn that children affected by lead poisoning may end up in special education programs and even jail.

“There’s hyperactivity, lack of impulse control and aggression – these individuals don’t have good judgment, can’t read or get a job,” said Marge Gorman, a professor of nursing and health at Madonna University in Livonia. “These are all things that can send you to prison.”

Reinke said an increase in learning disabilities from poisoning would require more special education programs.

In addition, 20 percent of the inmates Michigan prisons have been found to suffer from lead poisoning – and with inadequate testing, that percentage may grow, she said.

“We’re incurring the cost, but we can’t find out why Johnny can’t learn and why he ends up in the penal system,” Reinke said.  “No community can afford to have their children be lead poisoned.”

Children are most often poisoned when they chew on pieces of peeling paint or swallow house dust or soil that contains tiny chips of leaded paint in older buildings.  Lead-based paint is most common in houses and apartment buildings build before 1960.  Lead has not been used in house paint since 1978, but lead from house renovations can also be in air, water and food.

 “Toddlers from 12 to 36 months mouth things, they put everything in their mouths,” Reinke said.  “They have a rapid neurological growth and are very susceptible to poisoning.”

Young children who ingest lead may show no obvious effects of poisoning early on. 

Families can receive free blood tests from private health care providers, Medicare and the Women, Infants and Children program, a federal health and nutrition program for healthy mothers and babies.

Lapeer County’s Simmons said testing would be more successful if county health departments had more money.

“There’s a whole program that needs to be put in place here to get things on track,” Simmons said.

In Lapeer County, residents in seven zip codes are considered at a high risk of lead poisoning; 48003, 48412, 48727, 48444, 48461, 48464 and 48760. 

In these areas, more than 26 percent of the homes were built before 1950, the incidence of lead poisoning among children 12-26 is more than 12 percent or there is combined high percentage of pre-1950s homes and children under age 6 living in poverty, according to Simmons.