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Chinese children hospitalised for lead poisoning from battery plants
Twenty-four school children in eastern China have been taken to hospital with suspected lead poisoning from nearby battery factories, where at least 200 children in the area have high lead levels.
China’s official news agency said the authorities had shut two battery factories in Huaning county in the eastern province of Anhui.
China is the largest producer and consumer of lead for batteries, cars and electric bikes.
The children sent to hospital were aged between nine months and 16 years old.
Those affected came from homes located close to battery factories, despite laws prohibiting factories from being located within 500m of residential areas.
The Anhui Provincial Children's Hospital reportedly tested about 280 children from Gaohe Township in Huaning county for lead poisoning since late December.
Deputy director of the hospital's micro-elements testing laboratory Cheng Bangning said most had been diagnosed with high blood lead levels.
"We can draw a clear conclusion that the lead poisoning was caused by the lead pollution of the battery plants," said Zhang Gong, director of the hospital's child healthcare department.
Excessive amounts of lead in the blood can cause damage to the digestive, nervous and reproductive systems, and also stomach aches, anaemia and convulsions.
"My son is now very cranky and restless. He yells a lot," Huang Dazhai, the father of a five-year-old boy, was reported saying.
The boy was found to have 330.9 micrograms of lead per litre of blood. A level of 100mg per litre is considered enough to impair brain development in children.
