LAUSR

* Abbreviation: CDC — : Centers for Disease Control and Prevention Twenty-five years ago, in a commentary published in Pediatrics , Drs Needleman and Jackson1 asked whether we would still be treating lead poisoning in the 21st century. Unfortunately, despite considerable progress, our public health system is still failing to prevent children from being lead poisoned and the specter of lead poisoning continues to cast a shadow over the country: over 500 000 American children have a blood lead level of >5 μg/dL (>50 ppb); 23 million homes have 1 or more lead hazards; an unknown number of Americans drink water from lead service lines; and federal standards for lead in house dust, soil, and water fail to protect children.2,3 We have understandably focused on the plight of children in Flint, Michigan, but children in hundreds of other cities have blood lead levels higher than the children of Flint.4 Studying the impact of lead and other toxic chemicals, which are regularly found in the blood and body fluids of pregnant women and children,5–8 is only possible because technology was developed to measure them at extraordinarily low concentrations. The Centers for Disease Control and Prevention’s (CDC) environmental health laboratories has been at the forefront of developing laboratory techniques to measure a vast array of chemicals, such as lead, mercury, bisphenol A, and polybrominated diethyl esters. Beginning in 1976, the CDC has … Address correspondence to Bruce Lanphear, MD, 3415 Ash St, Vancouver, BC V6H 3V4, Canada. E-mail: blanphear{at}sfu.ca