Thousands of children poisoned by drinking water – New Technology

When the small community of Flint in the United States changed its drinking water supply led the new water that lead leached from old pipes. Thousands of children were in dangerously high levels of lead. The risk of something similar happening in Sweden is minimal, according to Swedish experts.

– Flint should be the last place that sustains the poisoning of drinking water, because the community is surrounded by water, said Dinko Luke at the research KIMAB, who recently took up blyskandalen in Flint.

the story begins when the city wanted to save money. It was the reason why they ended up buying drinking water from Detroit. The plan was to instead hire a new waterworks took the raw water from Lake Huron.

However, when the contract with the Detroit expired in the spring of 2014, the water plant is not finished. As a temporary solution took Flint instead water from the reserve pit, nearby Flint River.

The problem was that the river water had a higher chloride content and thus was more corrosive. Lead from the lines began to leach out into the water.

– Anti-corrosion treatment of water was not started until a year later, says Dinko Luke.

Early after the water change, people began to complain that the water looked dyed out and had a bad taste and odor. Even now, GM complained that the water got image glands in the factory to rust.

The city did test the waters and announced that blyvärdena below the MRL.

– But the officials did not have an eye on the lines consisting of lead, so the results of the measurements were not reliable, says Dinko Luke.

Eventually doctors find elevated lead levels in the blood of children. But despite these and individually metered high lead levels in tap water continued liable to deny that there were any risks with the water.

In October 2015, a year and a half after the water change, the city was convicted and Flint took back Detroit water supplier. Nowadays added orthophosphate to the water to reduce blyurlakningen from the pipes.

– This means that a protective layer of phosphate builds up on the inside of the pipes, but how long it will take is not known. So therefore, no one knows how long blyurlakningen will last, says Dinko Luke.

The risk that a similar poisoning scandal could occur in Sweden is considered remote by experts at the National Food Administration, Building and Planning and the industry organization Swedish Water.

– It is very rare with lead pipes in Sweden. We have copper, plastic or stainless steel pipes in houses and plastic or cast iron pipes in the street, says Gullvy Hedenberg, drinking water expert at Swedish Water.

– In Sweden, there are requirements that drinking water must not be corrosive. The competence of drinking water producers together with the regulatory framework implies that what happened in Flint can not happen here, says Torbjörn Lindberg, drinking water expert at the NFA.

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Swedish limit may be lowered

High lead levels can affect health in many ways. Most serious is the risk that children may be impaired intelligence. Although memory and concentration ability may be impaired, kidney function may be affected and blood pressure to rise. Fetuses and children are more susceptible to blypåverkan.

The limit for lead in drinking water is 15 micrograms per liter in the US, but already 5 micrograms per liter is given as “reasons for concern”. In Sweden, the limit value of 10 micrograms per liter. Within the NFA ongoing discussions about a reduction in value.