Abstract
BACKGROUND AND AIM: Public drinking water can be an important source exposure to lead, which can affect children's cognitive development and academic performance. Few studies have looked at the impact of lead exposures from community water supplies or their impact on school achievements. We examined the association between annual community water lead levels (WLLs) and children's academic performances at the school district level. METHODS: We matched the 90th percentile WLLs with the grade 3-8 standardized test scores from the Stanford Education Data Archive (SEDA) on Geographic School Districts (GSD) by geographic location and year. We used multivariate linear regression and adjusted for urbanicity, race, socioeconomic characteristics, school district, grade, and year. The model resembles a difference-in-difference (DID) approach in a panel data setting and can have a causal interpretation if certain assumptions are met. We also explored potential effect measure modifications and lag effects. RESULTS:After adjusting for potential confounders, a 5 μg/L increase in 90th percentile WLLs in a GSD was associated with approximately a 0.00684 [0.00021, 0.01348] standard deviation decrease in the average math test score in the same year. No association was found for English/Language Arts. CONCLUSIONS:Using a DID causal modeling method, we found an association between the annual fluctuation of WLLs and math test scores in Massachusetts school districts, after adjusting for confounding by urbanicity, race, socioeconomic factors, school district, grade and year. The implications of a detectable effect of WLLs on academic performance even at the modest levels evident in Massachusetts are significant and timely. Persistent efforts should be made to further reduce lead in drinking water. KEYWORDS: Heavy metals, Neurodevelopmental outcomes, Children's environmental health, Environmental epidemiology
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