Parents raising children near lead smelter fear fight against health impacts is ‘a losing battle’

When Sophie Bucknall fell pregnant with her first child in Port Pirie, she was aware of lead emissions related to the town’s lead smelter, but didn’t understand how serious the impacts could be. 

Ms Bucknall moved to the regional South Australian town from the United Kingdom in 2018 to be closer to her friend and never left. 

She said she knew there was a lead smelter, but hadn’t “really looked into” the risk it posed. 

The 130-year-old smelter, which is the town’s most significant employer, has been linked to a high risk of lead contamination among infants and children.

Fine lead dust is picked up by the wind and sprinkled just about everywhere, meaning parents have to be even more hawk-eyed when monitoring children and their hygiene.

Ms Bucknall had long heard about this risk from locals but admitted she thought “everyone [was] being a bit dramatic”.

“At that point I wasn’t planning on having a family … so I guess it didn’t really concern me,” she said.

But then when Ms Bucknall found out she was pregnant in 2022 she began to investigate the issue and was taken aback by what she found.

“The most shocking statistic for me was that if [a child has a lead level] between five and 10, that can affect [their] cognitive ability,” she said. 

“I found it incredibly overwhelming on top of an already overwhelming time.”

Port Pirie’s history of lead contamination

Located around 220 kilometres from Adelaide, Port Pirie is home to one of the largest lead and multi-metal smelters in the world, which has resulted in historical and ongoing lead contamination in the community.

Young children are at the greatest risk of lead contamination, and childhood exposure has been linked to lower IQ, academic achievement and a range of socio-behavioural problems.

Researcher at Avondale University in New South Wales Cynthia Barlow has researched the different pathways of lead contamination and its impact on young children.

She said it was also possible for mothers to pass lead onto their unborn child.

“While the child is in the uterus, they’re developing, and their developing is impacted by lead,” she said.

“This is also a concern once they’re born because these very young ages are when their bodies and their brains are forming, and if we have lead impacts at those ages, that’s when it’s most significant.”

Blood lead level testing 

SA Health has provided voluntary blood lead tests at Port Pirie’s Environmental Health Centre since 1984 to measure lead concentration in blood. 

The National Health and Medical Research Council said levels above 10 micrograms of lead per decilitre of blood (µg/dL) could harm body functions and organs in both adults and children.

It recommended a blood lead level greater than five µg/dL should be investigated and reduced. 

The latest SA Health report found 66.3 per cent of children tested in Port Pirie returned a blood lead level above that threshold. 

Dr Barlow said the blood lead levels of children over the past decade were too high and seemed to be gradually increasing.

“This is quite a real impact in the levels we’re seeing in Port Pirie,” she said.

“You’d expect children to have lowered IQs.

“That’s definitely causing them damage that’s going to follow them through their life.”

Ms Bucknall and her partner, a contractor at the smelter, found the local Environmental Health Centre’s services helpful.

But she said, despite following the centre’s advice, their daughter had recorded a blood lead level higher than they would have liked.

“I’ve got to vacuum every day, mop the floors every day, I’ve got to damp dust every day, I’ve got to wash our clothes when we come inside,” she said.

“I hired a cleaner, we had all our dogs professionally groomed, we had our carpets and mattresses professionally cleaned.

“[The Environmental Health Centre] do everything they can, however, I think they’re probably fighting a losing battle.”

Generational change

Despite growing up in Port Pirie, Adriana Porcelli did not remember “lead being a huge problem” until she moved back with two young children around a decade ago.

Now pregnant with her fourth child, she does everything she can to protect her family. 

“It was all very new to me, this whole lead thing, because I didn’t really remember it from when I grew up here as a kid and the processes I had to do,” Ms Porcelli said.

“I’ve had my babies over a 10-year period, so even when I had my first until this one here now, there is a huge difference.

 “I think the education my parents had in their generation around lead is very different to what we have now.”

Ms Porcelli’s husband works near the smelter, so she does everything she can to minimise lead exposure in the home. 

“We do keep all his [work] clothes in a separate basket, not near his normal clothes, so they’re not sitting on top of them if they aren’t washed straight away,” she said.

“My partner leaves his boots and bag outside at all times.

“[The children are] in a really good habit of washing their hands before every meal, and that’s really implemented at childcare too.”

In winter, Ms Porcelli also covers all her air-conditioner vents with cardboard to prevent lead from entering the home. 

If children record a high blood lead level, they may be referred to the Targeted Lead Abatement Program (TLAP), a joint initiative between smelter operator Nyrstar and the South Australian government to help the community minimise their exposure to lead.

The program was established in 2014 and TLAP executive director Peter Dolan said the children’s blood lead levels had not dropped as far as he would like.

“We will always be concerned when blood lead levels in children are too high, and they’re still too high,” he said.

“I think everyone needs to do their part … Nyrstar needs to do everything they can to reduce those emissions, and I believe they are working really hard on that.”

An unfair burden 

Dr Barlow said initiatives the EHC and TLAP recommended were helpful, but lead emissions in the atmosphere were “constant, and it’s everywhere”.

She said the investigation blood lead level was still too high, and other countries like America had set a lower reference level of 3.5 µg/dL.

“It’s really not fair to put the responsibility on the individual and the parents to protecting children from a problem they’re not creating,” she said.

SA Health declined an interview and did not answer specific questions about parent’s health concerns or whether more would be done to minimise lead contamination.

In a statement, an Environmental Health Centre spokesperson said it received “very positive feedback and strives to implement suggestions where possible to continuously improve our services”.