By Tim Bonfield
Enquirer staff writer

The standard treatment for childhood lead poisoning - a medication called succimer - does not reduce learning disabilities caused by lead exposure, according to a large study led by researchers in Cincinnati.

And because the medication isn't a cure, researchers say efforts to prevent lead poisoning by cleaning up old, poorly kept housing need to be expanded.

CHILDHOOD LEAD POISONING

More than 400 children in southwest Ohio were diagnosed with elevated levels of lead in their blood in 2002, but only some had levels as high as those participating in the succimer study published in Pediatrics. County Children above 20 micrograms per deciliter Hamilton 81 Butler 1 Clermont 1 Warren 0 Source: Ohio Department of Health

"We shouldn't be using our children as guinea pigs," said Dr. Kim Dietrich, a professor at the University of Cincinnati Department of Environmental Health and lead author of the study. "We should double our efforts to inspect and clean up target areas in the interiors of our cities, where we have found documented cases of lead-poisoned children. If we wait until the children's blood shows high levels of lead, the damage is already done."

The study - published in the July issue of Pediatrics - tracked 647 children in Cincinnati, Philadelphia, Baltimore and Newark, N.J.

All had significant amounts of lead in their blood - ranging from 20 to 44 micrograms per deciliter. That's well above the federal definition of unsafe amounts of lead - which starts at 10 micrograms per deciliter. At these levels, lead poisoning damages learning ability, memory, attention span and self-control. At higher levels, lead poisoning causes more severe, sometimes fatal, brain damage.

The children were diagnosed with lead poisoning between ages 1 and 3, then tracked until age 7. About half were treated with succimer and half were not.

The result: succimer therapy did reduce lead levels in blood, but the effect was only temporary in many cases. More importantly, the treatment produced "no benefit in cognitive, behavioral, and neuromotor endpoints."

Even though treatment doesn't reverse the brain damage, researchers say children still need to be screened for lead poisoning because the results can help trigger environmental actions.

In 2002, there were 81 children in Hamilton County diagnosed with lead poisoning above 20 micrograms per deciliter, 71 of whom lived in the city of Cincinnati, according to the Ohio Department of Health.

A total of two cases of similar lead poisoning were reported in Butler, Clermont and Warren counties combined.

The lack of suburban lead poisoning cases make Dietrich question devoting millions to a lead clean-up project in Liberty Township's Lexington Manor subdivision.

There, thousands of tons of tainted soil are being hauled away even though no children have been reported with lead poisoning. Yet projects of similar scale are not occurring in the West End, Over-the-Rhine or other neighborhoods where dozens of children have proven cases, Dietrich said.

"We need to make sure that children in our inner cities, living in older homes that cause actual lead poisoning, are adequately protected," Dietrich said.

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E-mail tbonfield@enquirer.com