Economic costs of childhood lead exposure in low- and middle-income countries

Children's blood lead levels have declined worldwide, especially after the removal of lead in gasoline. However, significant exposure remains, particularly in low- and middle-income countries. To date, there have been no global estimates of the costs related to lead exposure in children in deve...

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Bibliographic Details
Published in:Environmental health perspectives Vol. 121; no. 9; pp. 1097 - 1102
Main Authors: Attina, Teresa M, Trasande, Leonardo
Format: Journal Article
Language:English
Published: United States National Institute of Environmental Health Sciences 01.09.2013
Subjects:
Age
Blood
Blood levels
Child, Preschool
Children
Cost estimates
Costs
Costs and Cost Analysis
Developing countries
Developing Countries - statistics & numerical data
Disease prevention
Diseases
Economic analysis
Economic aspects
Economics
Environmental Exposure - adverse effects
Environmental Exposure - economics
Estimates
Exposure
Gasoline
Health
Health aspects
Humans
Income
Infant
Intelligence - drug effects
Intelligence Tests
LDCs
Lead (metal)
Lead - blood
Lead - toxicity
Lead content
Lead poisoning
Low income groups
Models, Economic
Pediatrics
Population
Public health
Regression Analysis
Sensitivity analysis
Trends
United States > US
USA
ASW, Caribbean Sea
Asia
Europe
Africa
Latin America
ANE, Europe
ISSN:0091-6765, 1552-9924, 1552-9924
Online Access:Get full text
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Summary:Children's blood lead levels have declined worldwide, especially after the removal of lead in gasoline. However, significant exposure remains, particularly in low- and middle-income countries. To date, there have been no global estimates of the costs related to lead exposure in children in developing countries. Our main aim was to estimate the economic costs attributable to childhood lead exposure in low- and middle-income countries. We developed a regression model to estimate mean blood lead levels in our population of interest, represented by each 1-year cohort of children < 5 years of age. We used an environmentally attributable fraction model to estimate lead-attributable economic costs and limited our analysis to the neurodevelopmental impacts of lead, assessed as decrements in IQ points. Our main outcome was lost lifetime economic productivity due to early childhood exposure. We estimated a total cost of $977 billions of international dollars in low- and middle-income countries, with economic losses equal to $134.7 billion in Africa [4.03% of gross domestic product (GDP)], $142.3 billion in Latin America and the Caribbean (2.04% of GDP), and $699.9 billion in Asia (1.88% of GDP). Our sensitivity analysis indicates a total economic loss in the range of $728.6-1162.5 billion. We estimated that, in low- and middle-income countries, the burden associated with childhood lead exposure amounts to 1.20% of world GDP in 2011. For comparison, in the United States and Europe lead-attributable economic costs have been estimated at $50.9 and $55 billion, respectively, suggesting that the largest burden of lead exposure is now borne by low- and middle-income countries.
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ISSN:0091-6765
1552-9924
1552-9924
DOI:10.1289/ehp.1206424