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CUNY SPH Assistant Professor Brian Pavilonis was awarded a grant from the PSC-CUNY Research Award Program to explore possible environmental sources of elevated blood lead levels in children in Brooklyn, New York.
Pavilonis and team, including Associate Professor Andrew Maroko, seek to characterize soil lead concentrations in publicly accessible neighborhood parks located throughout the borough and determine the ecological association between soil lead concentrations and blood lead levels in children.
“Soil is an important exposure pathway for lead and predictor of blood lead levels among children,” Pavilonis explains. “Brooklyn has the highest rate of elevated childhood blood lead levels in the city, with nearly double the rate of other boroughs.”
Previously, Pavilonis and team measured soil lead concentrations in 34 parks throughout New York City and found hypothesized high-risk contaminated areas had significantly larger mean concentrations of lead in soil and double the rate of children under the age of six years with elevated blood lead levels compared to low-risk areas. This study was recently accepted by the International Journal of Hygiene and Environmental Health and will be published imminently.
