tag:theconversation.com,2011:/us/topics/flint-24191/articlesFlint – The Conversation2019-05-24T10:44:11Ztag:theconversation.com,2011:article/1161192019-05-24T10:44:11Z2019-05-24T10:44:11ZWater stays in the pipes longer in shrinking cities – a challenge for public health<figure><img src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/276213/original/file-20190523-187157-5jamhv.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&rect=450%2C84%2C2861%2C2093&q=45&auto=format&w=496&fit=clip" /><figcaption><span class="caption">How long has that water already been in the system?</span> <span class="attribution"><a class="source" href="https://www.shutterstock.com/image-photo/drinking-water-flowing-fountain-9977686">mike.irwin/Shutterstock.com</a></span></figcaption></figure><p>The geographic locations where Americans live are shifting in ways that can negatively affect the quality of their drinking water. </p>
<p>Cities that experience long-term, persistent population decline are called <a href="https://www.routledge.com/Shrinking-Cities-Understanding-urban-decline-in-the-United-States/Weaver-Bagchi-Sen-Knight-Frazier/p/book/9781138601154">shrinking cities</a>. Although shrinking cities exist across the U.S., they are concentrated in the American Rust Belt and Northeast. Urban shrinkage can be bad for drinking water in two ways: through aging infrastructure and reduced water demand.</p>
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<p>Major federal and state investments in U.S. drinking water occurred after the World Wars and through the <a href="https://www.epa.gov/drinkingwatersrf/how-drinking-water-state-revolving-fund-works">Drinking Water State Revolving Fund</a> created by the 1996 amendments to the <a href="https://www.epa.gov/laws-regulations/summary-safe-drinking-water-act">Safe Drinking Water Act</a>. Many of the pipes and treatment plants built with those funds are now <a href="https://www.infrastructurereportcard.org/wp-content/uploads/2017/01/Drinking-Water-Final.pdf">approaching or have exceeded the end of their expected lifespan</a>. Shrinking cities often don’t have the tax base to pay for maintenance and replacement needs. So the infrastructure, which is largely underground, out of sight and out of mind, deteriorates largely outside of the public eye.</p>
<p>Water systems are typically designed for growth, not shrinkage. Oversized water treatment and distribution systems are common in shrinking cities that experience less water demand than they did decades ago. Consequently, shrinking cities can have drinking water sit in their old and corroded distribution system pipes longer than desired. The water age, or time water spends in pipes from treatment to consumption, increases. As engineers, scientists and public health professionals, <a href="https://scholar.google.com/citations?user=qixoZO4AAAAJ&hl=en&oi=ao">we</a> <a href="https://scholar.google.com/citations?user=vtHjmu8AAAAJ&hl=en&oi=ao">are</a> <a href="https://scholar.google.com/citations?user=uxN_efQAAAAJ&hl=en">studying</a> the health effects of drinking water and concerned that not enough attention is being paid to what high water age can mean for public health. </p>
<h2>More time in the pipes</h2>
<p>In the early 2000s, the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency published a report about how <a href="https://www.epa.gov/sites/production/files/2015-09/documents/2007_05_18_disinfection_tcr_whitepaper_tcr_waterdistribution.pdf">high water age causes undesirable changes</a> in the chemical, microbiological and physical quality of drinking water. Examples of water quality factors that can deteriorate with increased water age include levels of disinfection byproducts, corrosion, microbial growth (including pathogens) and nitrate. Each of these factors can directly affect public health.</p>
<p>As an example, there’s been a major shift in the type of microbes that cause waterborne disease outbreaks in the U.S. since the EPA report was published. In 2002-2003, <a href="https://www.cdc.gov/healthywater/surveillance/pdf/ss5308.pdf">two-thirds of these outbreaks</a> involved bacteria that cause diarrhea, and approximately a quarter of outbreaks were due to pneumonia that can occur when vulnerable people breathe in contaminated water while showering, for instance. In the most recent report, covering 2011-2012, <a href="https://www.cdc.gov/healthywater/surveillance/pdf/mm6431.pdf">the statistics reversed</a>, with pneumonia (mostly due to <a href="https://www.cdc.gov/legionella/about/history.html">Legionnaires’ Disease</a>) accounting for two-thirds of all outbreaks and 100% of all waterborne deaths during the monitoring period.</p>
<p>High water age contributes to low chlorine concentrations and corrosion, which can result in high levels of metals, such as iron. When these conditions occur during warmer summer months, growth of Legionnaires’ Disease bacteria increases. Low levels of disinfectant can also increase total bacteria in drinking water and support growth of some bacteria that can be unhealthy for the youngest, oldest and most ill consumers. </p>
<p>Importantly, routine monitoring of microbiological indicators in U.S. drinking waters hasn’t changed much since the Safe Drinking Water Act was passed in 1974. It still centers on detecting organisms that can cause diarrhea, not respiratory illnesses like pneumonia, and it is assumed that treatment methods that address the former will remove the latter. </p>
<p>Overall, there is still much that scientists do not know about the impact of water age on water quality conveyed through distribution systems and household pipes.</p>
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<a href="https://images.theconversation.com/files/276214/original/file-20190523-187176-3khha.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=1000&fit=clip"><img alt="" src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/276214/original/file-20190523-187176-3khha.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&fit=clip" srcset="https://images.theconversation.com/files/276214/original/file-20190523-187176-3khha.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=600&h=407&fit=crop&dpr=1 600w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/276214/original/file-20190523-187176-3khha.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=600&h=407&fit=crop&dpr=2 1200w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/276214/original/file-20190523-187176-3khha.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=600&h=407&fit=crop&dpr=3 1800w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/276214/original/file-20190523-187176-3khha.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&h=512&fit=crop&dpr=1 754w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/276214/original/file-20190523-187176-3khha.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=754&h=512&fit=crop&dpr=2 1508w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/276214/original/file-20190523-187176-3khha.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=754&h=512&fit=crop&dpr=3 2262w" sizes="(min-width: 1466px) 754px, (max-width: 599px) 100vw, (min-width: 600px) 600px, 237px"></a>
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<span class="caption">Flint has become emblematic of shrinking cities’ water problems.</span>
<span class="attribution"><a class="source" href="http://www.apimages.com/metadata/Index/Flint-Water/2ae6991884b24081b6c2b70e458f16f4/7/0">AP Photo/Carlos Osorio</a></span>
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<h2>Individuals working on a societal problem</h2>
<p>This infrastructure crisis in water has contributed to a nationwide trust crisis. Polls show that the U.S. public is increasingly worried “a great deal” about polluted drinking water, <a href="https://news.gallup.com/poll/207536/water-pollution-worries-highest-2001.aspx">up to 63% of Americans in 2016</a>, and it is the top concern among environmental factors that Americans care about. </p>
<p>The <a href="https://theconversation.com/the-science-behind-the-flint-water-crisis-corrosion-of-pipes-erosion-of-trust-53776">problems in Flint, Michigan</a> have become notorious, but the condition of Flint’s water system is not unique. It’s a shrinking city that already had high water age before corrosive water was passed through its pipes. The corrosion event in 2014-2015 leached lead into drinking water delivered to consumers. Lead is <a href="https://www.cdc.gov/nceh/lead/leadinwater/default.htm">a potent neurotoxin</a> that is problematic for children’s developing brains.</p>
<p>As exemplified by Flint, lead remains in some pipes, solders and “lead-free” fixtures that are not actually free of lead. Schools and residents are increasingly turning to point-of-use filters where water is treated to remove lead just prior to leaving the faucet. <a href="https://www.tandfonline.com/doi/full/10.1080/10934529.2019.1611141">While helpful</a>, these treatment options may not remove all contaminants of concern and may cause water quality to <a href="https://doi.org/10.1080/09603120410001725595">deteriorate</a> if filters are not maintained.</p>
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<span class="caption">School administrators and private citizens aren’t water quality experts but need to ensure their water is safe.</span>
<span class="attribution"><a class="source" href="http://www.apimages.com/metadata/Index/Washington-Schools-Lead/968d282e50784dada95a58c2b104003f/6/0">AP Photo/Ted S. Warren</a></span>
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<p>Residents and school principals aren’t experts in water treatment, yet are forced to become more involved with ensuring good drinking water quality in buildings. This requires them to rely on utilities for information on water quality – and water age is not routinely considered. Utilities are increasingly trying to convey technical information that has a high level of scientific uncertainty around it. Requests for more openness create a communication challenge for utilities – and run counter to the high-security practices and mindsets put in place in the aftermath of 9/11.</p>
<p>Greater transparency requires greater trust between water officials, public health officials, community members and water experts. At the same time, officials serving shrinking cities need to provide safe drinking water for those consumers who remain.</p>
<p>Despite all its accomplishments, the Safe Drinking Water Act is an imperfect law. Simply relying upon and then communicating about a water quality parameter that “meets all regulatory standards” – as per the law – is an inadequate way to communicate about water quality, as you can see in Flint.</p><img src="https://counter.theconversation.com/content/116119/count.gif" alt="The Conversation" width="1" height="1" />
<p class="fine-print"><em><span>Nancy Love receives funding from the National Science Foundation (Award No. 1632974) and the State of Michigan through a subcontract from Wayne State University. She is also a member of the Flint Technical Advisory Committee administered through Flint's City Hall, and appointed by Flint Mayor Karen Weaver to the Flint Water System Advisory Council. </span></em></p><p class="fine-print"><em><span>Richard Jackson served as a senior public health official at both the CDC and in California. Other than salary and prior service on public health and National Academies Committees, he has no conflicts to disclose. </span></em></p><p class="fine-print"><em><span>Shawn P. McElmurry has received funding related to this topic from the State of Michigan; National Science Foundation under award numbers 1832692 and 1633013; and the National Institute of Environmental Health Sciences of the National Institutes of Health (NIH) under award numbers R21 ES027199. He is also a member of the Flint Technical Advisory Committee administered through Flint's City Hall, and appointed by Flint Mayor Karen Weaver to the Flint Water System Advisory Council.</span></em></p>In many municipalities, aging water infrastructure is serving fewer people than it was built to accommodate. Out of sight has meant out of mind – but resulting changes in water quality may affect safety.Nancy Love, Professor of Civil and Environmental Engineering, University of MichiganRichard Jackson, Professor Emeritus of Environmental Health Sciences, University of California, Los AngelesShawn P. McElmurry, Associate Professor of Civil and Environmental Engineering, Wayne State UniversityLicensed as Creative Commons – attribution, no derivatives.tag:theconversation.com,2011:article/1164082019-05-15T10:43:35Z2019-05-15T10:43:35ZTooth fairy study reveals children near lead smelters are exposed to dangerous lead in the womb<figure><img src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/274192/original/file-20190513-183093-w2bd7d.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=496&fit=clip" /><figcaption><span class="caption">A worker recycling lead in a lead acid battery recovery facility.</span> <span class="attribution"><a class="source" href="https://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/0/08/Recycling_lead_in_a_lead-acid_battery_recovery_facility.jpg">National Institute for Occupational Safety and Health</a></span></figcaption></figure><p>The environmental tragedy in Flint, Michigan, in which drinking water contaminated with lead raised fears of potential health effects for exposed children, revealed the <a href="http://doi.org/10.2105/AJPH.2015.303003">failure of a regulatory system</a> to protect residents from lead exposure. </p>
<p>Until 2015 the Exide Technologies lead-acid battery smelter, in southeast Los Angeles County, California, recycled approximately <a href="http://doi.org/10.1089/env.2017.0019">11 million lead acid batteries</a> per year while operating on temporary state permits. This <a href="http://graphics.latimes.com/exide-battery-plant/">violated multiple federal environmental regulations</a> and exposed over 100,000 residents to lead and other toxic metals. The result was large-scale environmental disaster with <a href="https://www.latimes.com/local/lanow/la-me-exide-cleanup-story-so-far-20151121-story.html">lead contamination</a> of the air and soil in largely Latino communities. </p>
<p>As an environmental scientist and epidemiologist, I sought to understand lead pollution in children growing up in this area. For my research I collaborated with local community organizations and relied on an archive of biological samples that families often save: baby teeth. </p>
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<span class="attribution"><a class="source" href="https://envhealthcenters.usc.edu/infographics/infographic-living-near-lead">USC Environmental Health Centers</a>, <a class="license" href="http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-sa/4.0/">CC BY-SA</a></span>
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<h2>Understanding lead exposure</h2>
<p>Measuring historic exposure at toxic waste sites is often one of the most challenging aspects to understanding and anticipating future health impacts. Blood levels reflect exposure only from the past four weeks. But past exposure may be important indicators of harm. </p>
<p>Deciduous teeth, or “baby teeth,” incorporate minerals, including toxic metals, beginning in around the second trimester and continuing through early childhood. The formation of teeth occurs incrementally, like tree rings, so it is possible to reconstruct a child’s exposure to lead while in the womb and during the first year of life. </p>
<p>A initiative called the <a href="http://doi.org/10.1021/acs.est.9b00429">Truth Fairy Project</a> aimed to address this. Academics collaborated with the community living in southeast Los Angeles County to examine 50 shed deciduous teeth from 43 children living their entire lives within two miles of the Exide smelter. </p>
<p><a href="http://doi.org/10.1021/acs.est.9b00429">My team compared the levels of lead</a> in teeth to lead levels in the soil. We discovered a significant trend. The more lead in the soil in residential neighborhoods, the higher the levels in the teeth – both prenatally and during the first year of life.</p>
<p>We continue to collaborate with the community to work toward prevention of lead exposure and cleanup of the contaminated soil. </p>
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<span class="attribution"><a class="source" href="https://envhealthcenters.usc.edu/infographics/infographic-living-near-lead">USC Environmental Health Centers</a>, <a class="license" href="http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-sa/4.0/">CC BY-SA</a></span>
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<h2>Lead is still a potent toxicant</h2>
<p>Compelling scientific evidence concludes that there is <a href="http://doi.org/10.1289/ehp.7688">no safe threshold of childhood lead exposure</a>. </p>
<p>Lead (Pb) is a toxic metal that can cause <a href="https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC2560844/">damage to almost all organs and organ systems</a>. <a href="http://doi.org/10.1289/ehp.10424">Cognitive deficits</a> and neurodevelopmental delays are associated with <a href="http://doi.org/10.1289/ehp.11241">even very low levels of Pb exposure</a>. </p>
<p>Lead poisoning persists nationwide, with over <a href="http://doi.org/10.1016/j.jpeds.2016.05.005">500,000 children still burdened by elevated blood lead levels</a> (>5 microgram per deciliter, ug/dL) as of 2016. <a href="http://doi.org/10.1542/peds.2017-1400">Outdated regulations for lead</a> have failed to protect children’s health.</p>
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<span class="attribution"><a class="source" href="https://envhealthcenters.usc.edu/infographics/infographic-living-near-lead">USC Environmental Health Centers</a>, <a class="license" href="http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-sa/4.0/">CC BY-SA</a></span>
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<h2>Lead-acid battery smelters in the US</h2>
<p>Despite marked reductions in the use of lead in gasoline additives, <a href="https://doi.org/10.3133/sir20145086">ambient air emissions from lead-smelting</a> operations remain high in neighboring communities. The U.S. is second only to China as a producer of refined lead, producing about 11% of the world’s refined lead <a href="http://www3.cec.org/islandora/en/item/11220-hazardous-trade-examination-us-generated-spent-lead-acid-battery-exports-and">through recycling lead-acid batteries</a> at smelters. The tonnage of lead-acid batteries recycled in U.S. smelter facilities has more than doubled over the last 40 years, as the industry has rapidly consolidated production to a handful of facilities. Currently, <a href="http://doi.org/10.1289/ehp.11241">a few urban communities in the U.S.</a> bear the majority of pollution from recycling lead-acid batteries.</p>
<p>The Truth Fairy project provides further evidence that environmental injustice can be transmitted from mother to child via lead pollution. This burden is <a href="http://doi.org/10.1007/s40615-015-0124-9">disproportionately borne by disadvantaged communities</a>. </p>
<p>However, lead exposure in children is preventable. The most effective way to prevent lead poisoning involves reducing exposure through the identification and control of lead sources in in air, water, dust, soil and paint – before exposure occurs.</p>
<p>Today, however, agencies by and large focus on secondary prevention, <a href="http://doi.org/10.1126/science.281.5383.1617">investigating causes of elevated blood lead levels</a> only after individuals have suffered exposure. This leaves major gaps in the US public health system for lead exposure prevention, particularly with respect to low-income and communities of color.</p><img src="https://counter.theconversation.com/content/116408/count.gif" alt="The Conversation" width="1" height="1" />
<p class="fine-print"><em><span>Jill Johnston receives funding from NIH/NIEHS. </span></em></p>Lead contamination is not just a problem for Flint, Michigan. It is an issue in many regions. One epidemiologist figured out how to measure past lead exposure using treasured biological samples.Jill Johnston, Assistant Professor of Preventive Medicine, University of Southern CaliforniaLicensed as Creative Commons – attribution, no derivatives.tag:theconversation.com,2011:article/1163932019-05-01T21:41:13Z2019-05-01T21:41:13Z3 ways $2 trillion for infrastructure can fight inequality too<p>Imagine you have US$2 trillion to spend on patching up America’s crumbling roads, levees and other infrastructure. What would you fix first? </p>
<p>The nation’s <a href="https://www.infrastructurereportcard.org">needs are great</a>. The American Society of Civilian Engineers’ latest report, from 2017, highlighted derailing trains, roads full of potholes, levees breaching, bridges collapsing, undrinkable tap water and wastewater systems that are a menace to public health. </p>
<p>Choosing what gets funded – and what doesn’t – may be a question U.S. lawmakers will have to answer now that President Donald Trump, Speaker Nancy Pelosi and Senate Minority Leader Chuck Schumer <a href="https://www.baltimoresun.com/news/opinion/editorial/bs-ed-0501-infrastructure-20190430-story.html">have agreed to a very tentative</a> $2 trillion infrastructure plan. </p>
<p>While it’s still unclear where the money will come from, or how much they’ll ultimately pony up, the more important question for me is where that money should go – and whom it should help. I believe three areas stand out: water, roads and rail. </p>
<figure class="align-center ">
<img alt="" src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/272070/original/file-20190501-113839-1vz1viu.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&fit=clip" srcset="https://images.theconversation.com/files/272070/original/file-20190501-113839-1vz1viu.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=600&h=339&fit=crop&dpr=1 600w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/272070/original/file-20190501-113839-1vz1viu.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=600&h=339&fit=crop&dpr=2 1200w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/272070/original/file-20190501-113839-1vz1viu.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=600&h=339&fit=crop&dpr=3 1800w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/272070/original/file-20190501-113839-1vz1viu.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&h=426&fit=crop&dpr=1 754w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/272070/original/file-20190501-113839-1vz1viu.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=754&h=426&fit=crop&dpr=2 1508w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/272070/original/file-20190501-113839-1vz1viu.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=754&h=426&fit=crop&dpr=3 2262w" sizes="(min-width: 1466px) 754px, (max-width: 599px) 100vw, (min-width: 600px) 600px, 237px">
<figcaption>
<span class="caption">This train carrying ethanol derailed just last month in Texas.</span>
<span class="attribution"><a class="source" href="http://www.apimages.com/metadata/Index/Texas-Train-Derailment/c58a0a47fee647afb618df0274962a04/3/0">KDFW FOX4 via AP</a></span>
</figcaption>
</figure>
<h2>Infrastructure and inequality</h2>
<p>A sudden infusion of infrastructure spending <a href="https://fas.org/sgp/crs/misc/R44896.pdf">could benefit all Americans</a>, creating good jobs and <a href="https://www.epi.org/publication/the-potential-macroeconomic-benefits-from-increasing-infrastructure-investment/">higher incomes</a> for many. </p>
<p>Decrepit infrastructure <a href="https://www.infrastructurereportcard.org/the-impact/economic-impact/">costs each U.S. household an average</a> of $3,400 every year due to productivity losses, higher transportation costs and other problems, according to the ASCE. That amounts to about $4 trillion in total over a decade, plus 2.5 million in lost jobs. It can also result in lost lives or severe health risks, such as when a <a href="https://www.npr.org/2017/08/01/540669701/10-years-after-bridge-collapse-america-is-still-crumbling">bridge collapses</a> or <a href="https://www.usatoday.com/story/news/2016/03/11/nearly-2000-water-systems-fail-lead-tests/81220466/">lead from an old pipe enters the water supply</a>. </p>
<p>That’s likely why the public <a href="https://www.monmouth.edu/polling-institute/reports/monmouthpoll_us_052218/">overwhelmingly supports</a> more spending on infrastructure – and why the deal between Trump and the Democrats <a href="https://www.ttnews.com/articles/trump-congressional-democrats-agree-2-trillion-infrastructure-package">finally came together</a>. </p>
<p>But it’s unclear whether Congress will ultimately agree to spend the promised $2 trillion – or even whether that’ll be enough. So it’s important to establish <a href="https://theconversation.com/heres-what-to-look-out-for-when-politicians-promise-to-spend-big-on-infrastructure-78193">spending priorities</a>.</p>
<p>Spending in areas that will help <a href="http://www.paecon.net/PAEReview/issue78/Pressman78.pdf">struggling working and middle-class families</a> hurt by <a href="https://www.washingtonpost.com/news/wonk/wp/2018/01/04/massive-new-data-set-suggests-inequality-is-about-to-get-even-worse/">ever-rising economic inequality</a> would be a good place to start. As research by myself and others has shown, inequality <a href="https://theconversation.com/why-inequality-is-the-most-important-economic-challenge-facing-the-next-president-66806">makes almost every aspect of human life worse</a>, from <a href="https://www.bloomsbury.com/us/the-spirit-level-9781608191703/">infant mortality and crime</a> to politics.</p>
<h2>1. The water crisis</h2>
<p>That’s why a top priority should be addressing the lack of potable water in many parts of the country. </p>
<p>Water is necessary for basic human survival. And unsafe water puts people’s health and even their lives at risk. <a href="https://www.usatoday.com/story/news/2017/08/14/63-million-americans-exposed-unsafe-drinking-water/564278001">This has long-term consequences</a>, especially for children. Furthermore, it reduces earnings and increases health care costs, which are ultimately paid for by everyone through lower tax collections and higher insurance premiums. </p>
<p>The <a href="https://www.infrastructurereportcard.org/cat-item/drinking_water/">ASCE report gave America’s drinking water a D grade</a> due to all the waste and risks from the nation’s ancient, leaky and corroding piping system. And it’s a problem that <a href="https://theconversation.com/uk/topics/flint-water-crisis-24224">primarily afflicts poor communities</a>, like Flint, Michigan. </p>
<p><a href="https://www.latimes.com/opinion/op-ed/la-oe-mcgraw-water-poverty-data-20180322-story.html">Affluent communities usually have the political power</a> to ensure safe drinking water and the money to pay slightly higher taxes for clean water if necessary. Low-income neighborhoods are usually neighborhoods with little political clout and will suffer most from water problems. </p>
<p>Low-income areas are also less able to cope with undrinkable water and afford the costs of replacing tap water with bottled water. And <a href="https://www.theatlantic.com/business/archive/2017/10/geographic-mobility-and-housing/542439/">people living in poor neighborhoods</a> lack the ability to move, especially if they own homes that <a href="https://www.marketwatch.com/story/lead-poisoning-crisis-sends-flint-real-estate-market-tumbling-2016-02-17">declined sharply in value</a> because of water problem, as happened in Flint. </p>
<figure class="align-center ">
<img alt="" src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/272079/original/file-20190501-113867-2frscw.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&fit=clip" srcset="https://images.theconversation.com/files/272079/original/file-20190501-113867-2frscw.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=600&h=400&fit=crop&dpr=1 600w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/272079/original/file-20190501-113867-2frscw.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=600&h=400&fit=crop&dpr=2 1200w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/272079/original/file-20190501-113867-2frscw.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=600&h=400&fit=crop&dpr=3 1800w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/272079/original/file-20190501-113867-2frscw.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&h=503&fit=crop&dpr=1 754w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/272079/original/file-20190501-113867-2frscw.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=754&h=503&fit=crop&dpr=2 1508w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/272079/original/file-20190501-113867-2frscw.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=754&h=503&fit=crop&dpr=3 2262w" sizes="(min-width: 1466px) 754px, (max-width: 599px) 100vw, (min-width: 600px) 600px, 237px">
<figcaption>
<span class="caption">U.S. roads also got a ‘D’ grade.</span>
<span class="attribution"><a class="source" href="https://www.shutterstock.com/image-photo/car-tyre-about-pass-through-large-1380916994?src=0PCJ5IQ3o5i7kJHmCjIQcQ-1-98">F8 studio/Shutterstock.com</a></span>
</figcaption>
</figure>
<h2>2. Potholes and the poor</h2>
<p>Repairing America’s crumbling road system is another urgent priority. </p>
<p>Roads, which also <a href="https://www.infrastructurereportcard.org/cat-item/roads/">got a D grade</a> from the ASCE, are increasingly falling into disrepair and becoming more dangerous for drivers. Again, the costs of the growing number of cracks and potholes fall most heavily on the poor – but they are also a burden for the middle class. </p>
<p>Bad roads mean an increased risk of car damage and more trips to the mechanic for expenses that <a href="https://www.cnet.com/roadshow/news/growing-repair-costs-car-tech-aaa-study/">easily can run into the thousands of dollars</a>. Yet a <a href="https://www.federalreserve.gov/publications/files/2017-report-economic-well-being-us-households-201805.pdf">recent Federal Reserve study</a> found that 40% of Americans did not have even $400 to deal with an emergency expense. </p>
<p>An essential and unanticipated car repair could drain a savings account or be beyond someone’s ability to pay. A high-interest loan from a payday lender could result in rates of <a href="https://www.incharge.org/debt-relief/how-payday-loans-work/">well over 100% to consumers desperate for cash</a>. </p>
<p>Or worst case, if repairs can’t be paid for immediately, it might mean losing a job or dealing with lost income as a result of being absent from work. Poorer Americans <a href="https://www.epi.org/publication/millions-of-working-people-dont-get-paid-time-off-for-holidays-or-vacation/">typically have fewer vacation</a> or personal days to use in such circumstances. </p>
<h2>3. Bridging divides with rail</h2>
<p>Railroads, <a href="https://www.infrastructurereportcard.org/cat-item/rail/">which got the grade of D-</a>, could also help reduce inequality that results from economic disparities among cities. </p>
<p>Many smaller cities <a href="https://theconversation.com/six-charts-that-illustrate-the-divide-between-rural-and-urban-america-72934">have seen falling populations</a> and declining incomes ever since the Great Recession, while <a href="https://www.nytimes.com/2017/10/10/business/economy/big-cities.html">larger metropolitan areas have thrived</a>. </p>
<p>Although the <a href="https://www.counterpunch.org/2018/06/27/what-makes-american-towns-thrive/">causes of this growing divide are still unclear</a>, improved rail service provides one potential solution. </p>
<p>For example, high-speed rail at affordable prices <a href="http://reconnectingamerica.org/assets/Uploads/bestpractice083.pdf">would make it easier</a> for people living in medium-sized metropolitan areas like Akron and Canton, Ohio, to take jobs in larger cities like Cleveland that are not easily commutable at present. This would raise incomes for people living in these smaller cities and also increase the prices of their homes, where middle-class families store most of their wealth. </p>
<p>There are lots of ways to spend $2 trillion on infrastructure. Doing it in ways that help poorer and middle-income communities would put tax dollars where they are needed most.</p><img src="https://counter.theconversation.com/content/116393/count.gif" alt="The Conversation" width="1" height="1" />
<p class="fine-print"><em><span>Steven Pressman does not work for, consult, own shares in or receive funding from any company or organization that would benefit from this article, and has disclosed no relevant affiliations beyond their academic appointment.</span></em></p>Just as America’s highways, sewage systems and water pipes need fixing, so does the growing gap between rich and poor. Trump and the Democrats could use that money to address both.Steven Pressman, Professor of Economics, Colorado State UniversityLicensed as Creative Commons – attribution, no derivatives.tag:theconversation.com,2011:article/1077142018-11-27T14:55:33Z2018-11-27T14:55:33ZGM closures: Oshawa needs more than ‘thoughts and prayers’<figure><img src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/247452/original/file-20181127-130884-54sxkq.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=496&fit=clip" /><figcaption><span class="caption">Laurie Nickel and her daughter Stephanie hold a protest sign during a union meeting after General Motors announced it would be closing its plant in Oshawa, Ont., that employs 2,500 people.
</span> <span class="attribution"><span class="source">THE CANADIAN PRESS/Eduardo Lima</span></span></figcaption></figure><p>All eyes in Canada have turned to Oshawa, Ont., following the announcement by General Motors that it will end auto manufacturing in the city after more than a century of production.</p>
<p>In the coming days we will hear about community resilience and the inevitability of market forces. Some of those impacted will be asked to share their feelings and politicians of all stripes will send <a href="https://nationalpost.com/opinion/john-ivison-federal-government-cant-save-the-gm-plant-or-change-the-weather">their thoughts and prayers</a> to the nearly 3,000 autoworkers who will be out of work. Then we will all move on. </p>
<p><div data-react-class="Tweet" data-react-props="{"tweetId":"1067082236686753792"}"></div></p>
<p>Does any of this sound familiar? It should. We have been living this story for decades. North America is filled with former mine, mill and factory towns. Some were once synonymous with the departing company or the products that they produced. If we were to put all of these de-industrialized cities on a map, it would be crowded with hurt and heartache.</p>
<p>Among the most famous are the former auto towns of <a href="https://utorontopress.com/ca/industrial-sunset-4">Flint, Mich., which is still living with the poisoned half-life of deindustrialization decades later</a>, and the “Motor City” itself. <a href="https://www.nytimes.com/2012/12/23/books/review/detroit-city-is-the-place-to-be-by-mark-binelli.html">Detroit lost a staggering 180,000 manufacturing jobs</a> in a devastating seven-year period from 1978 to 1984. The city’s population plunged from 1.8 million in 1950 to just 700,000 today. </p>
<p>A similar story has unfolded in Canada. Windsor, Ont., was devastated in 1951 when Ford decided to relocate its auto-assembly plant to Oakville, located outside of Toronto. Entire regions now feel the pain. </p>
<figure class="align-center ">
<img alt="" src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/247437/original/file-20181127-130887-6c3sb5.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&fit=clip" srcset="https://images.theconversation.com/files/247437/original/file-20181127-130887-6c3sb5.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=600&h=400&fit=crop&dpr=1 600w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/247437/original/file-20181127-130887-6c3sb5.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=600&h=400&fit=crop&dpr=2 1200w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/247437/original/file-20181127-130887-6c3sb5.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=600&h=400&fit=crop&dpr=3 1800w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/247437/original/file-20181127-130887-6c3sb5.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&h=503&fit=crop&dpr=1 754w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/247437/original/file-20181127-130887-6c3sb5.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=754&h=503&fit=crop&dpr=2 1508w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/247437/original/file-20181127-130887-6c3sb5.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=754&h=503&fit=crop&dpr=3 2262w" sizes="(min-width: 1466px) 754px, (max-width: 599px) 100vw, (min-width: 600px) 600px, 237px">
<figcaption>
<span class="caption">Two workers of Oshawa’s General Motors plant embrace at a union meeting called to discuss the closing of the plant that will put 2,500 people out of work next year.</span>
<span class="attribution"><span class="source">THE CANADIAN PRESS/Eduardo Lima</span></span>
</figcaption>
</figure>
<p>In my home region of Northern Ontario, for example, there are now more than 20 former mill towns with names like Iroquois Falls, Red Rock, Marathon, Elliot Lake, Fort Frances, Smooth Rock Falls and Sturgeon Falls.</p>
<p>I have been interviewing displaced industrial workers from Canada and the United States since the early 1990s. A plant closing is about much more than lost paycheques. It shatters people’s sense of belonging and identity. Long-term workers in particular lose a social structure in which they find validation.</p>
<p>The human cost of job loss can be enormous, leading to depression, failing marriages or health and even suicide. </p>
<h2>It’s like being run over</h2>
<p>Gabriel Solano, a GM worker in Detroit, explained what was lost the first time a plant closed under him: </p>
<blockquote>
<p>“There are things I can’t discuss… I lost a part of me. Me, as a person who said, ‘I have a goal and have a dream.’ To come home, I no longer have a job. The wife looks at you. You’re looking at this baby, you’re looking at this house and you’re realizing ‘you know what? Something’s missing and it’s part of me.’ I don’t so much feel that I was missing GM but I was missing a part of me. Something internal. It’s hard to explain because it’s an emotion. It’s a feeling. Because it took all of those years to build this emotion and this feeling and then, it’s not there. So, you end up with a blank in your life. There is a blank. Yes, there is.”</p>
</blockquote>
<figure class="align-left ">
<img alt="" src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/247443/original/file-20181127-130896-f9sdnl.png?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=237&fit=clip" srcset="https://images.theconversation.com/files/247443/original/file-20181127-130896-f9sdnl.png?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=600&h=603&fit=crop&dpr=1 600w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/247443/original/file-20181127-130896-f9sdnl.png?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=600&h=603&fit=crop&dpr=2 1200w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/247443/original/file-20181127-130896-f9sdnl.png?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=600&h=603&fit=crop&dpr=3 1800w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/247443/original/file-20181127-130896-f9sdnl.png?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&h=758&fit=crop&dpr=1 754w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/247443/original/file-20181127-130896-f9sdnl.png?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=754&h=758&fit=crop&dpr=2 1508w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/247443/original/file-20181127-130896-f9sdnl.png?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=754&h=758&fit=crop&dpr=3 2262w" sizes="(min-width: 1466px) 754px, (max-width: 599px) 100vw, (min-width: 600px) 600px, 237px">
<figcaption>
<span class="caption">Displaced Detroit Autoworker Gabriel Solano pictured in his abandoned GM Factory.</span>
<span class="attribution"><span class="source">David W. Lewis</span></span>
</figcaption>
</figure>
<p>Gabriel Solano closed out three GM plants before his life was cut short by an early death.</p>
<p>One time he was even transferred into another assembly plant two weeks before it, too, closed.</p>
<p>Each time left its scars. </p>
<p>Gabriel said:</p>
<blockquote>
<p>“You see the train coming, you’re on the track. ‘It’s going to stop.’ ‘It’s not coming.’ You hear the whistle and you feel the vibration. And then next thing you know you’ve been run over. And you still don’t even believe it after its run over you and a hundred cars have run past.”</p>
</blockquote>
<p>The sense of betrayal runs deep in working-class communities. They feel betrayed by their employers, their unions, their governments, sometimes even by their own communities.</p>
<p>Another displaced worker said: </p>
<blockquote>
<p>“I heard about the closure on television on the 6 o’clock news. Then, a couple weeks later they phoned me up and said ‘you got a 35-year pin that we have here. We’d like to give it to you.’ I said ‘ok.’ He said, ‘meet us at the front gate.’ You know, everything was closed so the fellow, our superintendent at the time, he gave me the 35-year pin. You can picture a chain linked fence, he handed it to me through the fence. ‘Here is your 35-year pin.’”</p>
</blockquote>
<h2>Oshawa did not need to close</h2>
<p>From a historical perspective, the Oshawa closure is completely unnecessary. </p>
<p>Had the provisions of <a href="https://utorontopress.com/ca/auto-pact-4">the 1965 Canada-U.S. Auto Pact</a> not been traded away by our leaders to get a free trade deal in the 1980s, GM would have been unable to close the plant because the Big Three automakers were required to produce as many vehicles as they sold in Canada. There were also Canadian content rules in place for auto parts. </p>
<p>Instead, since then, GM has closed one plant after another, starting with its Toronto-area Scarborough van plant in 1993, followed in 2004 by its assembly plant in Sainte-Thérèse, Que., the Oshawa truck plant in 2008 and the Windsor transmission plant in 2010. GM’s Canadian operations are now limited to two communities in southern Ontario: an assembly plant in Ingersoll and an engine plant in St. Catharines.</p>
<p>General Motors of Canada has been <a href="https://www.thestar.com/business/2018/11/25/gms-century-of-automaking-in-oshawa.html">part of Oshawa since 1918</a>. Had the Canadian and Ontario governments placed more stringent conditions on the $3-billion bailout of GM in 2009, the Oshawa plant might have been saved.</p>
<p>For example, in 1979-80, the federal and Ontario governments helped bail out Chrysler on the condition that it re-invest hundreds of millions into its Canadian manufacturing plants. The result was the reindustrialization of Ontario at a time when plants were closing in the United States.</p>
<figure class="align-right ">
<img alt="" src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/247440/original/file-20181127-130896-g4m7s4.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=237&fit=clip" srcset="https://images.theconversation.com/files/247440/original/file-20181127-130896-g4m7s4.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=600&h=400&fit=crop&dpr=1 600w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/247440/original/file-20181127-130896-g4m7s4.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=600&h=400&fit=crop&dpr=2 1200w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/247440/original/file-20181127-130896-g4m7s4.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=600&h=400&fit=crop&dpr=3 1800w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/247440/original/file-20181127-130896-g4m7s4.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&h=503&fit=crop&dpr=1 754w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/247440/original/file-20181127-130896-g4m7s4.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=754&h=503&fit=crop&dpr=2 1508w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/247440/original/file-20181127-130896-g4m7s4.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=754&h=503&fit=crop&dpr=3 2262w" sizes="(min-width: 1466px) 754px, (max-width: 599px) 100vw, (min-width: 600px) 600px, 237px">
<figcaption>
<span class="caption">Jerry Dias, president of UNIFOR, the union representing the workers of Oshawa’s General Motors car assembly plant.</span>
<span class="attribution"><span class="source">THE CANADIAN PRESS/Eduardo Lima</span></span>
</figcaption>
</figure>
<p>Had the Canadian and Ontario governments not quietly sold off all their shares in GM (at a heavy loss) in 2016 that they acquired as a result of the bailout, then we might still have had the needed leverage to convince GM not to abandon Oshawa. National Unifor President Jerry Dias, the union president who represents the Oshawa autoworkers, said as much at the time. The union had used what negotiating power it had, pushing the Big Three to reinvest in Canada — but, without backup, it was not enough. </p>
<p>Industrial workers are thought to inhabit the past, not the present — even though the world hasn’t deindustrialized. </p>
<p>There is a depressing inevitability to plant closings that prevents us from responding with more than platitudes. We have come to accept the <a href="https://www.ubcpress.ca/the-deindustrialized-world">structural violence</a> of industrial plant closure as a fact of life. They have become normalized to such an extent that we may not even recognize plant closings as a form of violence. </p>
<figure class="align-center ">
<img alt="" src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/247439/original/file-20181127-130902-183193x.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&fit=clip" srcset="https://images.theconversation.com/files/247439/original/file-20181127-130902-183193x.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=600&h=399&fit=crop&dpr=1 600w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/247439/original/file-20181127-130902-183193x.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=600&h=399&fit=crop&dpr=2 1200w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/247439/original/file-20181127-130902-183193x.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=600&h=399&fit=crop&dpr=3 1800w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/247439/original/file-20181127-130902-183193x.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&h=502&fit=crop&dpr=1 754w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/247439/original/file-20181127-130902-183193x.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=754&h=502&fit=crop&dpr=2 1508w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/247439/original/file-20181127-130902-183193x.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=754&h=502&fit=crop&dpr=3 2262w" sizes="(min-width: 1466px) 754px, (max-width: 599px) 100vw, (min-width: 600px) 600px, 237px">
<figcaption>
<span class="caption">Workers of Oshawa’s General Motors car assembly plant, listen to Jerry Dias, president of UNIFOR, the union representing the workers, at the union headquarters, in Oshawa, Ont. on Monday, Nov. 26, 2018.</span>
<span class="attribution"><span class="source">THE CANADIAN PRESS/Eduardo Lima</span></span>
</figcaption>
</figure>
<p>Decades of internalized despair have broken out into open revolt against political “elites” across the deindustrialized world. Brexit, the election of Donald Trump as U.S. President (thanks to the five Rust Belt states that flipped from Obama to Trump) and the rise of right-wing populism are all tied to working-class rage. </p>
<p>So far, Canada has largely escaped this political tumult. But if our own political parties continue to fail working people, this too will change.</p><img src="https://counter.theconversation.com/content/107714/count.gif" alt="The Conversation" width="1" height="1" />
<p class="fine-print"><em><span>Steven High receives funding from the Social Sciences and Humanities Research Council and Concordia University. </span></em></p>General Motors has announced it’s closing plants in Canada and the U.S. Many of the towns have built cars for decades or longer. A plant closing shatters people’s sense of belonging and identity.Steven High, Professor of History, Centre for Oral History and Digital Storytelling (COHDS), Concordia UniversityLicensed as Creative Commons – attribution, no derivatives.tag:theconversation.com,2011:article/918042018-03-22T10:42:19Z2018-03-22T10:42:19ZWant to fight crime? Plant some flowers with your neighbor<figure><img src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/211403/original/file-20180321-165577-pep406.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=496&fit=clip" /><figcaption><span class="caption">Flint, Mich., has one of the highest crime rates in the country for a city of its size. One neighborhood has found a novel way to fight back.</span> <span class="attribution"><span class="source">Carlos Osorio/AP Images</span></span></figcaption></figure><p>Neighborhoods struggling with physical decline and high crime often become safer simply when local residents work together to fix up their neighborhood.</p>
<p>My colleagues and I at the <a href="http://yvpc.sph.umich.edu/">University of Michigan School of Public Health Youth Violence Prevention Center</a> have spent nearly a decade <a href="https://scholar.google.com/citations?user=B9HaG4kAAAAJ&hl=en&oi=sra">documenting</a> why. Research from cities across the United States shows how small changes to urban environments — like planting flowers or adding benches — reduce violence. </p>
<p>The result is an emerging crime prevention theory we call “busy streets.” Here’s how it works.</p>
<h2>From broken windows to busy streets</h2>
<p>Busy streets flips the logic of the <a href="https://www.npr.org/2016/11/01/500104506/broken-windows-policing-and-the-origins-of-stop-and-frisk-and-how-it-went-wrong">broken windows theory</a> – a <a href="https://www.theatlantic.com/magazine/archive/1982/03/broken-windows/304465/">controversial criminological approach to public safety</a> – on its head. Broken windows defenders see urban disorder in U.S. cities – graffiti, litter, actual broken windows and the like – as a catalyst of antisocial behavior. So they direct police to <a href="https://www.pbs.org/wgbh/frontline/article/the-problem-with-broken-windows-policing/">crack down on minor offenses</a> like vandalism, turnstile jumping and public drinking. </p>
<p>Proponents of busy streets theory, on the other hand, believe it’s better for neighborhoods to clean up and maintain their own city streets. </p>
<p>Our research in Flint, Michigan – a once prosperous manufacturing hub near Detroit that’s now synonymous with <a href="https://news.vice.com/article/the-unraveling-of-flint-how-vehicle-city-stalled-long-before-the-water-crisis">industrial decline, unemployment and crime</a> – documents this process in action. </p>
<p>Flint’s median income today is less than US$26,000, and more than half of families with children live in poverty. It lost 27 percent of its residents since 1990, U.S. <a href="https://www.census.gov/quickfacts/fact/table/flintcitymichigan/PST045216">census data</a> shows. Nearly 1 in 5 homes is vacant. Crime followed this cycle of abandonment and decay, <a href="https://www.huduser.gov/portal/periodicals/em/summer16/highlight2.html">as it has in postindustrial cities across the Rust Belt</a>. Flint now has the <a href="https://ucr.fbi.gov/crime-in-the-u.s/2016/crime-in-the-u.s.-2016/tables/table-4">second-highest homicide rate among U.S. cities with populations under 100,000</a>, after Gary, Ind. </p>
<p>In 2012, the <a href="https://www.facebook.com/uacflint/">University Avenue Corridor Coalition</a> – a group of residents, businesses and two local colleges – decided to try to prevent crime by fixing up a <a href="https://tigerprints.clemson.edu/mcrp/70/">3-mile stretch of University Avenue running through the Carriagetown neighborhood of central Flint</a>. We began measuring their results in 2014.</p>
<p>The group started holding frequent neighborhood cleanup days to <a href="http://www.flintside.com/features/reinvetinguniversityavenue.aspx">fix up vacant lots and abandoned buildings</a>, symbolically “owning” them by adding lighting, sidewalk repair, benches and plantings. The owners were usually happy to allow neighbors to fix up their private property for free. Sometimes, they even pitched in.</p>
<p>Those changes, we observed, inspired other homeowners and businesses on this flat, three-lane road to <a href="https://doi.org/10.1016/j.landurbplan.2014.12.003">spruce up their properties</a>, too – what one local resident called the “spreading effect of pride.”</p>
<p>“I think that people really just needed to see that, ‘Hey, somebody does care about this other than just us,‘” said a coalition member.</p>
<p>The group also successfully pushed to get a local corner liquor store – dubbed the “Stab 'n’ Grab” because fights broke out there so often – transformed into a Jimmy John’s sandwich shop. That may sound like just another chain restaurant, but in this part of Flint there are few businesses and almost nowhere else to eat. A new sandwich shop was a huge development. </p>
<figure class="align-center ">
<img alt="" src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/211214/original/file-20180320-31633-127sp7g.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&fit=clip" srcset="https://images.theconversation.com/files/211214/original/file-20180320-31633-127sp7g.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=600&h=600&fit=crop&dpr=1 600w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/211214/original/file-20180320-31633-127sp7g.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=600&h=600&fit=crop&dpr=2 1200w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/211214/original/file-20180320-31633-127sp7g.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=600&h=600&fit=crop&dpr=3 1800w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/211214/original/file-20180320-31633-127sp7g.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&h=754&fit=crop&dpr=1 754w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/211214/original/file-20180320-31633-127sp7g.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=754&h=754&fit=crop&dpr=2 1508w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/211214/original/file-20180320-31633-127sp7g.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=754&h=754&fit=crop&dpr=3 2262w" sizes="(min-width: 1466px) 754px, (max-width: 599px) 100vw, (min-width: 600px) 600px, 237px">
<figcaption>
<span class="caption">The corner of University Avenue and North Grand Traverse Street in Flint has been transformed. Above: a liquor store where fights used to break out. Below: the Jimmy John’s sandwich shop that replaced it.</span>
<span class="attribution"><span class="source">Google Street View</span></span>
</figcaption>
</figure>
<p>The vacant lot across the street from the Jimmy John’s, previously a favorite public drinking spot, was turned into a park called University Square. It now hosts regular events, replete with food trucks and lawn games. </p>
<p>When people drive by this once derelict intersection and see a block party underway, a community organizer told me, their jaws drop. </p>
<h2>Busy streets have less crime</h2>
<p>These <a href="http://www.cpted.net/">surface-level environmental changes</a> turned out to have profound economic and societal effects on this part of central Flint. </p>
<p>We surveyed residents there in 2014 – before the intervention began – as well as in 2016 and 2017. We are now preparing the results of the Flint study for publication in an academic journal, but here’s a snapshot of our findings.</p>
<p>Over time, community members reported fewer mental health problems, said they’d been victims of crime less often, and felt less afraid. That’s probably because crime did go down along the University Avenue Corridor: According to <a href="https://drive.google.com/file/d/1-15B-s82mACSSVPwJjOt-d-b16-3IT6e/view">the coalition’s latest report</a>, assaults decreased 54 percent, robberies 83 percent and burglaries 76 percent between 2013 and 2018. </p>
<p>To test the connection with the coalition’s work, we compared this area to a control group of Flint neighborhoods that had suffered similar levels of disinvestment and urban decay. We learned that places where empty lots were being maintained by the community had nearly 40 percent fewer assaults and violent crimes than untouched vacant lots.</p>
<p>This finding is similar to data from other cities. From 1999 to 2008, for example, the city of Philadelphia <a href="http://doi.org/10.1093/aje/kwr273">cleaned up 4,436 vacant lots, signaling “ownership”</a> with fencing, benches, plantings and the like. Gun assaults in areas where the interventions occurred <a href="http://www.pnas.org/content/pnas/early/2018/02/20/1718503115.full.pdf">dropped by 29 percent over three years</a>. Nuisance crimes like loitering and vandalism declined 30 percent. </p>
<p>Philadelphia also saw economic gains from maintaining empty land and fixing up abandoned properties. According to an <a href="http://ajph.aphapublications.org/doi/pdf/10.2105/AJPH.2016.303434">economic analysis published in the American Journal of Public Health</a> in 2016, for every dollar spent reoccupying an abandoned building, taxpayers saved $5 in potential criminal justice costs. Cleaned-up vacant lots saved the city even more: $26 per dollar spent.</p>
<p>People in areas of Philadelphia with newly greened lots also reported exercising more and experiencing less stress, presumably because they they felt more comfortable being outside. </p>
<h2>Resilient cities</h2>
<p>One likely reason that crime drops after joint neighborhood improvement projects is community engagement. Residents <a href="https://umich.maps.arcgis.com/apps/MapJournal/index.html?appid=bc01aab1491542418477312a5fdaef68">in the University Corridor intervention area</a> reported participating more in neighborhood watches, block associations and community events than in the area where residents didn’t undertake improvement projects. </p>
<p>In other words, when neighbors work together to clean up, say, an empty lot, they don’t just eliminate <a href="http://www.nytimes.com/2011/10/28/us/foreclosures-lead-to-crime-and-decay-in-abandoned-buildings.html">the kind of dark, empty place that lends itself to criminal activity</a>. There are spin-off effects, too. </p>
<p>Nicer public spaces encourage more people to spent time in those places, which helps neighbors get to know each other. And when people know each other, they look out for each other, monitoring activity in their neighborhood more closely. Streets get busy. </p>
<figure class="align-center ">
<img alt="" src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/211400/original/file-20180321-165547-1ml7ctj.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&fit=clip" srcset="https://images.theconversation.com/files/211400/original/file-20180321-165547-1ml7ctj.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=600&h=427&fit=crop&dpr=1 600w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/211400/original/file-20180321-165547-1ml7ctj.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=600&h=427&fit=crop&dpr=2 1200w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/211400/original/file-20180321-165547-1ml7ctj.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=600&h=427&fit=crop&dpr=3 1800w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/211400/original/file-20180321-165547-1ml7ctj.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&h=536&fit=crop&dpr=1 754w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/211400/original/file-20180321-165547-1ml7ctj.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=754&h=536&fit=crop&dpr=2 1508w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/211400/original/file-20180321-165547-1ml7ctj.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=754&h=536&fit=crop&dpr=3 2262w" sizes="(min-width: 1466px) 754px, (max-width: 599px) 100vw, (min-width: 600px) 600px, 237px">
<figcaption>
<span class="caption">Community members hauled garbage out of the Flint River.</span>
<span class="attribution"><span class="source">CPTED</span>, <span class="license">Author provided</span></span>
</figcaption>
</figure>
<p>We also found that the efforts to upgrade public spaces along the University Corridor spurred a modest local economic recovery. </p>
<p>Before the 2013 intervention, very few businesses were operating in the area. From 2015 to 2017, seven new businesses opened. More commerce makes streets busier, too.</p>
<h2>Role of the police</h2>
<p>Based on our surveys, University Corridor residents were also more willing to report crimes to the police after the 2013 intervention began. </p>
<p>This was critical in this mostly African-American neighborhood, where many people expressed mistrust in local law enforcement. They said officers were “never around when you need them.” </p>
<p>Indeed, Flint’s police department – overworked and underfunded – was called “broken” in a Feb. 25, 2018, <a href="https://www.newyorker.com/culture/photo-booth/inside-a-broken-police-department-in-flint-michigan">New Yorker article</a>. </p>
<p>So when Kettering University, one of two partner colleges in the University Corridor coalition, got a <a href="http://www.mlive.com/news/flint/index.ssf/2018/01/criminal_prevention_grant_incr.html">grant that financed more police presence in the area</a>, many locals said they were grateful. </p>
<p>Police can lay the foundation for neighborhood revitalization efforts to succeed. The aim is not to aggressively flood high-crime areas with police – as cities like <a href="http://www.nytimes.com/2004/01/13/nyregion/police-widen-plan-to-flood-crime-areas.html">New York</a> and <a href="https://www.pbs.org/wgbh/frontline/article/the-problem-with-broken-windows-policing/">Newark did</a> in their broken windows days – but rather to increase foot patrols. This shows residents that the city cares about their neighborhood and their safety. </p>
<p>But law enforcement is not the main reason “busy streets” work to prevent crime. Rather, after years of studying community resilience, I believe that locally driven revitalization projects make troubled neighborhoods safer because they recognize residents not as victims but as agents of change. </p>
<p>Together, neighbors <a href="http://journals.sagepub.com/doi/abs/10.1177/1090198114558590">help people rebuild the kind of economic and social fabric that keeps communities healthy</a>. </p>
<p><em>This article has been updated to more accurately reflect Flint’s current population size and homicide rate.</em></p><img src="https://counter.theconversation.com/content/91804/count.gif" alt="The Conversation" width="1" height="1" />
<p class="fine-print"><em><span>Marc A Zimmerman is the director of the Prevention Research Center of Michigan and the CDC-funded Youth Violence Prevention Center. He is the editor of Youth and Society, a member of the editorial board for Health Education Research and editor emeritus of Health Education and Behavior.</span></em></p>Crime is way down in one Flint, Michigan, neighborhood, where locals have teamed up to revamp neglected public spaces. Here, why ‘busy streets’ can prevent violence and save cities money.Marc A. Zimmerman, Professor, University of MichiganLicensed as Creative Commons – attribution, no derivatives.tag:theconversation.com,2011:article/722342017-02-07T03:40:36Z2017-02-07T03:40:36ZShould scientists engage in activism?<figure><img src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/155712/original/image-20170206-18511-12ze1se.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&rect=238%2C103%2C3849%2C2475&q=45&auto=format&w=496&fit=clip" /><figcaption><span class="caption">When scientists stand up, do they lose standing?</span> <span class="attribution"><a class="source" href="https://www.flickr.com/photos/151208038@N06/32301539922">Liz Lemon</a></span></figcaption></figure><p>Have you heard that scientists are planning a <a href="https://www.marchforscience.com/">march on Washington</a>? The move is not being billed as a protest, but rather as a “celebration of our passion for science and a call to support and safeguard the scientific community,” although it comes as a direct response to recent policy changes and statements by the Trump administration.</p>
<p>Not everyone thinks the nonprotest protest is a good thing. It’s “<a href="https://www.nytimes.com/2017/01/31/opinion/a-scientists-march-on-washington-is-a-bad-idea.html?_r=0">a terrible idea</a>,” wrote Robert Young, a geologist at Western Carolina University, in The New York Times. The march, Young said, will just reinforce a belief among some conservatives that “scientists are an interest group,” and polarize the issue, making researchers’ jobs more difficult. Others find that argument <a href="http://www.the-scientist.com/?articles.view/articleNo/48295/title/Will-a-March-Help-Science-/">less than convincing</a>, pointing out that science and politics have always been intertwined. </p>
<p>As the founders of the blog Retraction Watch and the Center for Scientific Integrity, we often see researchers reluctant to push for or embrace change – whether it’s to the conventional way of dealing with misconduct in journals (which for years was basically to not do so) or addressing problems of reproducibility of their experiments. To the timorous, airing dirty laundry, and letting the public in on the reality of science, could endanger public trust – and funding. </p>
<p>So this isn’t the first time scientists and engineers have voiced similar concerns. Take the example of Marc Edwards and his colleagues at Virginia Tech: To many people watching the Flint water crisis, they were heroes. After being asked to visit by concerned residents, they found, and announced, that people in the beleaguered city were being exposed to excessive amounts of lead through their tap water. They also launched a crowdfunding campaign to raise money for water filters for city residents and created a <a href="http://www.flintwaterstudy.org">website</a> to push their findings about the hazards of the city’s water supply and shame governments at all levels to act. </p>
<p>If not for their tireless efforts, thousands of children may have been exposed to dangerous amounts of lead for far longer than they already were. Even the Environmental Protection Agency has <a href="http://www.nytimes.com/2016/10/21/us/epa-waited-too-long-to-warn-of-flint-water-danger-report-says.html">acknowledged that it waited too long to sound the alarm</a>.</p>
<figure class="align-center zoomable">
<a href="https://images.theconversation.com/files/155733/original/image-20170206-27202-16n4h7l.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=1000&fit=clip"><img alt="" src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/155733/original/image-20170206-27202-16n4h7l.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&fit=clip" srcset="https://images.theconversation.com/files/155733/original/image-20170206-27202-16n4h7l.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=600&h=400&fit=crop&dpr=1 600w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/155733/original/image-20170206-27202-16n4h7l.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=600&h=400&fit=crop&dpr=2 1200w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/155733/original/image-20170206-27202-16n4h7l.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=600&h=400&fit=crop&dpr=3 1800w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/155733/original/image-20170206-27202-16n4h7l.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&h=503&fit=crop&dpr=1 754w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/155733/original/image-20170206-27202-16n4h7l.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=754&h=503&fit=crop&dpr=2 1508w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/155733/original/image-20170206-27202-16n4h7l.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=754&h=503&fit=crop&dpr=3 2262w" sizes="(min-width: 1466px) 754px, (max-width: 599px) 100vw, (min-width: 600px) 600px, 237px"></a>
<figcaption>
<span class="caption">Marc Edwards testifying before Congress about the situation in Flint.</span>
<span class="attribution"><a class="source" href="http://www.apimages.com/metadata/Index/Flint-Water/2fa72d5c4c904022bc0b1876304238ae/4/0">AP Photo/Andrew Harnik</a></span>
</figcaption>
</figure>
<p>But that’s not exactly how the editor of a leading engineering journal sees things.</p>
<p>In October, a <a href="http://pubs.acs.org/doi/full/10.1021/acs.est.6b04432">remarkable editorial</a> appeared in the journal Environmental Science & Technology. The essay, by University of California, Berkeley engineering professor and Water Center Director <a href="http://www.ce.berkeley.edu/people/faculty/sedlak">David Sedlak</a>, ES&T’s editor-in-chief, expressed concern that some of his colleagues in the field had crossed the “imaginary line” between scientist and advocate.</p>
<p>“Speaking out against a corrupt or incompetent system may be the product of a culture where idealism, personal responsibility, and Hollywood’s dramatic sensibilities conspire to create a narrative about the noble individual fighting injustice,” Sedlak wrote.</p>
<p>By becoming “allies of a particular cause, no matter how just, we jeopardize the social contract that underpins the tradition of financial support for basic research.” In other words, don’t cross Congress – which many scientists already view as <a href="http://www.the-scientist.com/?articles.view/articleNo/10030/title/What-Proxmire-s-Golden-fleece-Did-For--And-To--Science/">hostile to their profession</a> – and risk retaliation in the form of budget cuts. That’s no small pie, either. Through its oversight of the National Institutes of Health, the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention, the Department of Energy and other agencies and programs, Congress holds the strings to a research purse <a href="https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Science_policy_of_the_United_States#/media/File:U.S._research_funding.png">worth nearly US$70 billion a year</a>.</p>
<iframe src="https://datawrapper.dwcdn.net/lUDdX/3/" frameborder="0" allowtransparency="true" allowfullscreen="allowfullscreen" webkitallowfullscreen="webkitallowfullscreen" mozallowfullscreen="mozallowfullscreen" oallowfullscreen="oallowfullscreen" msallowfullscreen="msallowfullscreen" width="100%" height="600"></iframe>
<p>Let’s take a moment to absorb all that. Some (unnamed but easily identified) scientists, lulled by the media, have cast themselves as superheroes in a struggle against villains born of their own conceit. Their arrogance and vanity threaten to awaken the master, who will punish us all for the sins of a few. We rarely get the opportunity to watch a chilling effect in action, but you can almost see the breath of researchers caught up in a debate over the proper role of scientists in the crisis.</p>
<p>It’s not just engineers who fear speaking out. “We have too often been reluctant to voice our protest, for fear of incurring the [National Institute of Mental Health’s] displeasure (and losing whatever opportunities we still have for funding),” <a href="http://www.nytimes.com/2016/10/15/opinion/theres-such-a-thing-as-too-much-neuroscience.html">wrote neuroscientist John Markowitz in The New York Times last fall</a>. In a refreshing piece, Markowitz was arguing that “there’s such a thing as too much neuroscience.” As cofounders of Retraction Watch, a blog that focuses on some of science’s nasty episodes, we are occasionally admonished that pointing out cases of fraud – even when we also <a href="http://retractionwatch.com/category/by-reason-for-retraction/doing-the-right-thing/">praise good behavior</a> – will give anti-science forces ammunition.</p>
<p>In some ways, we should be glad scientists are acknowledging these concerns, instead of pretending they’re never swayed by the almighty dollar. But anyone who clings to the notion that science exists in a pure vacuum, untainted by politics, economics or social justice needs also to understand that science is a human endeavor and scientists have the same eyes and ears for injustice and outrage as the rest of us. Although the conduct of science demands honesty and rigor, nowhere is it written that researchers must remain silent when governments or other powerful players either misuse science or suppress findings in the service of harmful policies.</p>
<p>And before Edwards and his efforts on behalf of the Flint community, some scientists have spoken out. Clair Patterson, a physical chemist, put himself on a decades-long collision course with industry when he <a href="http://www.nytimes.com/1995/12/08/us/clair-c-patterson-who-established-earth-s-age-is-dead-at-73.html">took on lead poisoning</a>. John Snow earned the ire of Londoners when he <a href="http://www.ph.ucla.edu/epi/snow/snowcricketarticle.html">removed the pump handle on a cholera-infested well</a>, and wasn’t vindicated until after his death. It took Peter Buxtun several years to stop the infamous Tuskegee syphilis experiment; he eventually had to <a href="http://world.time.com/2013/06/10/10-notorious-leakers-and-how-they-fared/slide/peter-buxton/">leak documents to reporter Jean Heller in 1972</a>.</p>
<p>Edwards and his colleagues, we would argue, are part of a long tradition of bridging the worlds of science and policy. They have been instrumental in bringing not only attention but change to the beleaguered city of Flint. And money: Thanks in part to their pressure, the Senate in September <a href="https://www.nytimes.com/2016/09/16/us/politics/flint-michigan-water-senate-aid.html">voted overwhelmingly</a> to approve $100 million in aid for Flint, and hundreds of millions more in loans from the Environmental Protection Agency for upgrading municipal water infrastructures and studying exposure to lead.</p>
<figure class="align-center zoomable">
<a href="https://images.theconversation.com/files/155741/original/image-20170206-27208-vnf8i1.gif?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=1000&fit=clip"><img alt="" src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/155741/original/image-20170206-27208-vnf8i1.gif?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&fit=clip" srcset="https://images.theconversation.com/files/155741/original/image-20170206-27208-vnf8i1.gif?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=600&h=432&fit=crop&dpr=1 600w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/155741/original/image-20170206-27208-vnf8i1.gif?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=600&h=432&fit=crop&dpr=2 1200w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/155741/original/image-20170206-27208-vnf8i1.gif?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=600&h=432&fit=crop&dpr=3 1800w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/155741/original/image-20170206-27208-vnf8i1.gif?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&h=543&fit=crop&dpr=1 754w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/155741/original/image-20170206-27208-vnf8i1.gif?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=754&h=543&fit=crop&dpr=2 1508w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/155741/original/image-20170206-27208-vnf8i1.gif?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=754&h=543&fit=crop&dpr=3 2262w" sizes="(min-width: 1466px) 754px, (max-width: 599px) 100vw, (min-width: 600px) 600px, 237px"></a>
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<span class="caption">Tuskegee syphilis study doctor injects a subject with a placebo.</span>
<span class="attribution"><a class="source" href="https://commons.wikimedia.org/wiki/File:Tuskegee-syphilis-study_doctor_injects_subject_with_placebo.gif">Centers for Disease Control</a></span>
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<p>In a <a href="http://flintwaterstudy.org/2016/10/engineers-shall-hold-paramount-the-safety-health-and-welfare-of-the-public-but-not-if-it-threatens-our-research-funding/">stinging rebuke to Sedlak</a>, Edwards and three coauthors – Amy Pruden, <a href="https://theconversation.com/we-helped-uncover-a-public-health-crisis-in-flint-but-learned-there-are-costs-to-doing-good-science-54227">Siddhartha Roy and William Rhoads</a> – blasted the critical editorial as a “devastating, self-indictment of cowardice and perverse incentives in modern academia.”</p>
<p>Indeed, scientists who accept funding with the tacit agreement that they keep their mouths shut about the government are far more threatening to an independent academy than those who speak their minds.</p>
<p>Since Nov. 8, it has been painfully clear that science will be playing defense for a while. The United States has never seen a regime <a href="https://www.scientificamerican.com/article/trump-comments-on-science-are-shockingly-ignorant/">so hostile to science and the value of the scientific method</a>. President Donald Trump has <a href="http://www.politifact.com/truth-o-meter/statements/2016/jun/03/hillary-clinton/yes-donald-trump-did-call-climate-change-chinese-h/">declared climate change a “hoax” cooked up by the Chinese</a>. He has <a href="https://www.washingtonpost.com/politics/trump-to-meet-with-proponent-of-debunked-tie-between-vaccines-and-autism/2017/01/10/4a5d03c0-d752-11e6-9f9f-5cdb4b7f8dd7_story.html">flirted seriously with debunked anti-vaccination views</a> and declared that polls (read, data) that are negative about his ambitions are “fake news.” </p>
<p>Science and politics are not always compatible. And science need not always triumph over policy: After all, research shows that steroids improve athletic performance, but we have a compelling political interest to ban them. The same can be said of eugenics. Research must always be ethical, and ethics is a conversation that includes scientists and policymakers.</p>
<p>Still, while the two domains are separate, the divide is, and should be, bridgeable. <a href="http://flintwaterstudy.org/2016/10/engineers-shall-hold-paramount-the-safety-health-and-welfare-of-the-public-but-not-if-it-threatens-our-research-funding/">As Edwards and his colleagues write</a>, “The personal and professional peril is great, the critics are numerous and vocal, but staying silent is to be complicit in perpetrating injustice. And no matter what may come of the rest of our lives or careers, we are certain of one thing: Flint was a community worth going out on a limb for, and by upholding a just cause, we enhanced the social contract between academics and the public.”</p>
<p>That could easily be said of the March for Science. Except now it’s not just a limb but the entire tree that’s in peril.</p><img src="https://counter.theconversation.com/content/72234/count.gif" alt="The Conversation" width="1" height="1" />
<p class="fine-print"><em><span>The Center for Scientific Integrity, of which Ivan Oransky is executive director, receives funding from the Arnold Foundation, the Helmsley Trust, and the MacArthur Foundation.</span></em></p><p class="fine-print"><em><span>The Center for Scientific Integrity, of which Adam Marcus is editorial director, receives funding from the Arnold Foundation, the Helmsley Trust, and the MacArthur Foundation</span></em></p>In the wake of the Flint water crisis and with a new notably anti-science president, U.S. scientists are reevaluating how to navigate the tension between speaking out and a fear of losing research funding.Ivan Oransky, Distinguished Writer In Residence, Arthur Carter Journalism Institute, New York UniversityAdam Marcus, Adjunct Faculty for Advanced Academic Programs, Johns Hopkins UniversityLicensed as Creative Commons – attribution, no derivatives.tag:theconversation.com,2011:article/656262016-09-20T01:47:07Z2016-09-20T01:47:07ZHow ZIP codes nearly masked the lead problem in Flint<p>I write this as we approach the first anniversary of my involvement in the <a href="https://www.theguardian.com/us-news/flint-water-crisis">Flint Water Crisis</a>, an ongoing catastrophe and basic failure of government accountability that will soon approach three years. </p>
<p>On Sept. 25, 2015, I received a call from my colleague – the now-renowned <a href="http://msutoday.msu.edu/news/2016/mona-hanna-attisha-named-one-of-times-most-influential-people/">Dr. Mona Hanna-Attisha</a> – asking if I could run some basic <a href="http://www.esri.com/products/arcgis-capabilities/spatial-analysis">spatial analysis</a> of blood lead data collected from area pediatric clinics. I had heard rumblings that <a href="http://www.mlive.com/news/flint/index.ssf/2015/09/study_shows_twice_as_many_flin.html">blood lead levels were on the rise</a> in Flint but that <a href="http://www.mlive.com/news/flint/index.ssf/2015/09/state_says_its_data_shows_no_c.html">state officials were pushing back</a> against her findings.</p>
<p>My job was to examine blood lead data from our local <a href="http://www.hurleymc.com/services/childrens-hospital/">Hurley Children’s Hospital</a> in Flint for spatial patterns, or neighborhood-level clusters of elevated levels, so we could quash the doubts of state officials and confirm our concerns. Unbeknownst to me, this <a href="http://ajph.aphapublications.org/doi/pdf/10.2105/AJPH.2015.303003">research project</a> would ultimately help blow the lid off the water crisis, vindicating months of activism and outcry by dedicated Flint residents.</p>
<p>As I ran the addresses through a precise parcel-level <a href="http://pro.arcgis.com/en/pro-app/help/data/geocoding/what-is-geocoding-.htm">geocoding</a> process and visually inspected individual blood lead levels, I was immediately struck by the disparity in the spatial pattern. It was obvious Flint children had become far more likely than out-county children to experience elevated blood lead when compared to two years prior. </p>
<p>How had the state so blatantly and callously disregarded such information? To me – a <a href="http://geography.uwo.ca/">geographer</a> trained extensively in geographic information science, or computer mapping – the answer was obvious upon hearing their unit of analysis: the ZIP code.</p>
<p>Their ZIP code data included people who appeared to live in Flint and receive Flint water but actually didn’t, making the data much less accurate than it appeared.</p>
<p>ZIP codes – the bane of my existence as a geographer. They confused my childhood friends into believing they lived in an entirely different city. They add cachet to parts of our communities (think 90210) while generating skepticism toward others relegated to less sexy ZIP codes.</p>
<p>Dr. Tony Grubesic, an Arizona State University professor, has called them “one of the <a href="http://www.sciencedirect.com/science/article/pii/S0038012106000516">quirkier ‘geographies’</a> in the world.” Dr. Nancy Krieger, a Harvard University professor, and colleagues have called out their <a href="http://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC1447194/">unacceptability</a> for small-area analyses.</p>
<p>If I were to have simply summarized blood lead statistics by ZIP code, the pattern would not have been striking. The state, having done just this, incorrectly concluded that the change in water source had no discernible effect on Flint children.</p>
<p>Why exactly were ZIP codes so poorly suited to analyzing the Flint water crisis? I will share some reasons and argue that public health researchers should move away from a sole reliance on ZIP codes, or at least admit the shortcomings of ZIP code analysis.</p>
<h2>When the boundaries don’t line up</h2>
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<img alt="" src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/138107/original/image-20160916-17029-ywva09.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&fit=clip" srcset="https://images.theconversation.com/files/138107/original/image-20160916-17029-ywva09.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=600&h=776&fit=crop&dpr=1 600w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/138107/original/image-20160916-17029-ywva09.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=600&h=776&fit=crop&dpr=2 1200w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/138107/original/image-20160916-17029-ywva09.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=600&h=776&fit=crop&dpr=3 1800w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/138107/original/image-20160916-17029-ywva09.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&h=976&fit=crop&dpr=1 754w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/138107/original/image-20160916-17029-ywva09.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=754&h=976&fit=crop&dpr=2 1508w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/138107/original/image-20160916-17029-ywva09.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=754&h=976&fit=crop&dpr=3 2262w" sizes="(min-width: 1466px) 754px, (max-width: 599px) 100vw, (min-width: 600px) 600px, 237px">
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<span class="caption">ZIP codes and city boundaries of Flint do not align.</span>
<span class="attribution"><span class="source">Author provided.</span>, <span class="license">Author provided</span></span>
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<p>In Flint’s case, the state’s error was introduced because “Flint ZIP codes” do not align well with the city of Flint or its water system. The city and water system are almost 100 percent coterminous – that is, they share the same boundaries.</p>
<p>One-third of all homes with a Flint ZIP code lie outside the city. Thus, the state’s numbers for Flint were watered down by an additional 50 percent of addresses that weren’t in the city and weren’t using Flint water. This is referred to in geography as the <a href="http://support.esri.com/other-resources/gis-dictionary/term/MAUP">modifiable areal unit problem</a>.</p>
<p>Of the residential ZIP codes with Flint mailing addresses, only 48502 and 48503 lie completely within the city. ZIPs 48504, 48505, 48506 and 48507 are split between the city of Flint and outlying municipalities. ZIP 48532 contains very few homes actually in the city of Flint. In total, Flint ZIP codes used in the state’s analysis blanket parts of eight different municipalities (seven townships and one city) surrounding Flint.</p>
<p>That the solution to this error was as simple as pinpointing patient addresses rather than relying on ZIP codes is both frightening and appalling. It reflects a fundamental ignorance of geography and a tendency to uncritically accept numbers at face value. While analysis by ZIP code tends to be the default analysis when public health professionals and researchers make a foray into mapping, more and more research in the past two decades has suggested that the reliance on ZIPs may be misplaced.</p>
<h2>Why are ZIP codes insufficient measures for geographically specific phenomena?</h2>
<p>The folly reflects an all-too-common reliance on arbitrary boundaries for defining public health issues. ZIP codes have recently garnered attention as being a <a href="http://commissiononhealth.org/PDF/0d5f4bd9-2209-48a2-a6f3-6742c9a7cde9/Issue%20Brief%207%20Dec%2009%20-%20Message%20Translation.pdf">key determinant of health</a>, curbing the old idea that biology was the primary director of one’s health. </p>
<p>The idea behind “why ZIP codes matter” is that where you live influences your opportunities to conduct a healthy lifestyle. While this emphasis on neighborhood-specific effects is important (and has been the focus of urban planning and geographical inquiry for decades), the use of ZIP codes can mask more local issues.</p>
<p>To be truly useful as units of analysis for defining neighborhood effects on health, any geographic area should be relatively homogeneous in terms of its social and built environmental characteristics. But unlike postal codes in other countries which represent small areas suitable for in-depth geographic inquiry (Google “N6C 2B5” for a Canadian example), ZIP codes are woefully unqualified as units of analysis.</p>
<h2>Created for mail, not health care, delivery</h2>
<p>The ZIP – or Zone Improvement Plan – code was designed by the <a href="http://www.zipboundary.com/zipcode_history.html">U.S. Postal Service in 1963</a> as a logistical solution to sorting the mail in growing cities. Thus, ZIP code designations were based on the area that a collection of mail carriers could reasonably cover each day; they had little to do with geography or municipal boundaries.</p>
<p>ZIP codes were arbitrarily delineated and covered a range of neighborhood types; in most small and midsized cities, one ZIP code can cover urban, suburban and rural neighborhoods with highly variable socioeconomic characteristics.</p>
<p>The public health field is now learning that their heterogeneity actually makes them very poor representations for understanding exposure or health disparities. ZIP codes aren’t even contiguous areas – they are actually just linear features along roads. Yet they influence many aspects of our lives, including car insurance rates, sales tax assignment and home appraisal values, to name a few.</p>
<p>The reality is that very few tangible urban amenities – including school attendance zones, city boundaries, water systems and voting districts – are coterminous with ZIP code boundaries. </p>
<p>More useful are units such as census block groups, wards, planning districts or municipal designations for neighborhoods within a city. Each of these adhere to some temporally consistent, spatially bounded definition, and can more appropriately be used to understand how one neighborhood varies compared to another.</p>
<p>The use of ZIP codes by the public health and medical fields as a primary way to understand health statistics is thus concerning because heterogeneous populations can mask inequalities. As well, program deployment based on ZIP code inquiries is often not well aligned geographically with populations that need assistance.</p>
<h2>Where do we go from here?</h2>
<p>Still, we should be careful not to remove ZIP codes from consideration entirely. They can still be useful for characterizing phenomena that manifest disparities at a large scale, such as rates of chronic disease, exposure to non-point source pollution, regional employment trends and so on. But we must be more critical toward unusual geographies, particularly when our topic of interest is more local.</p>
<p>A solution to the ZIP code problem could come from either side. For example, a U.S. Postal Service-led redesign of ZIP codes into something more coherent as a planning tool would enable their continued use in public health with greater integrity. Conversely, a more critical eye toward ZIP codes by the public health profession would open the field to better spatial measures for exposure.</p>
<p>Either way, the current arrangement is clearly not working. If we are content with using ZIP code-level data, we leave open the possibility that further health issues could be masked by these quirky geographies. </p>
<p>The Flint water crisis is not the only example of ZIP codes hiding a public health problem; it is just one of the more apparent. When the ZIP code is the final arbiter of health statistics, we risk assuming that all public health issues can be packaged neatly into the same box.</p>
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<p><a href="http://www.aag.org">Richard Casey Sadler is a member of the American Association of Geographers</a></p>
<footer>The association is a funding partner of The Conversation US.</footer>
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<p class="fine-print"><em><span>Richard Casey Sadler is a member of the American Association of Geographers.</span></em></p>High blood lead levels in children in Flint, Michigan were obscured in part because of an outdated method of studying public health – the ZIP code. Here’s why we need to make use of a better way.Richard Casey Sadler, Assistant Professor, Michigan State UniversityLicensed as Creative Commons – attribution, no derivatives.tag:theconversation.com,2011:article/625252016-09-08T10:16:30Z2016-09-08T10:16:30ZHow big data and algorithms are slashing the cost of fixing Flint’s water crisis<figure><img src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/136813/original/image-20160906-25237-rutqkr.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=496&fit=clip" /><figcaption><span class="caption">A big data analysis indicates the focus on service line replacement may only go so far at fixing Flint's water issues. </span> <span class="attribution"><a class="source" href="https://www.flickr.com/photos/hz536n/27805760502/in/photolist-Jn6MRQ-8CJqeH-8UwScV-oXJBB1-oXJhMr-reXmpG-oXJABf-oXJgVM-pferGx-pfcqE3-oXKfPK-oXJB8A-pferM2-oXKfxT-pdcvYW-oXJBph-7rVXe8-pdcvEu-pfeqEc-pdcwu5-peXzSD-e5yH7Z-6twbbV-oXKeyt-oXKfZp-oXJh1B-oXKim9-u87foW-peXzEe-u8gAJg-pfeqTZ-v2Nea3-g9jjuz-pfcqWL-gaibLK-6twbbK-oXJB5Q-gahAZh-oXJBSb-oXKga4-uMwvSG-gahJC2-peXAyP-oXKgUS-pfern4-g9iSNL-gahtDM-qY8HVS-oXJhSr-peXzf6">George Thomas/flickr</a></span></figcaption></figure><p>The water crisis in Flint, Michigan highlights a number of serious problems: a public health outbreak, inadequate urban infrastructure, <a href="https://theconversation.com/we-helped-uncover-a-public-health-crisis-in-flint-but-learned-there-are-costs-to-doing-good-science-54227">environmental injustice</a> and political failures. But when it comes to recovery, the central challenge, and one that has received relatively little attention, is our lack of useful information and understanding. </p>
<p>Who is most at risk? Where are the harmful sources of lead? Where should resources be allocated? Using modern big-data tools, we can answer these questions and help inform the response to this crisis. </p>
<p>With the support of our <a href="http://mdst.eecs.umich.edu">student team at the University of Michigan</a>, we have aggregated a trove of available data around Flint’s water issues, including water test results, records of the service lines that deliver water to homes, information on parcels of land and water usage. Leveraging new algorithmic and statistical tools, we are able to produce a significantly more complete picture of the risks and challenges in Flint.</p>
<p>These methods strongly resemble those used by Facebook, Amazon and other large tech companies who collect vast amounts of data from users. But whereas Facbeook’s algorithms crunch through uploaded photographs to detect faces and Amazon’s models predict which products you’ll like, we are using these analytics tools to detect homes with high risk of lead contamination and to predict the locations of lead pipes buried underground or hidden in the homes of residents.</p>
<p>What have we learned? Here are a few takeaways from our research.</p>
<h2>Lead contamination varies widely across homes and is highly scattered around Flint, but it is surprisingly predictable</h2>
<p>The headlines on Flint could easily lead one to believe all homes in the city have dangerously high levels of lead. But in fact, using data from the state’s <a href="http://www.michigan.gov/flintwater/0,6092,7-345-76292_76294_76297---,00.html">sentinel program</a>, we found during a period in February only between 8 and 15 percent of homes had lead above the federal action level of 15 parts per billion (ppb). </p>
<p>Indeed, things have been improving from January through August 2016, according to the test data from the sentinel program. Based on about 750 homes monitored repeatedly, fewer homes have tested above the action level over time. Almost half of all samples have virtually no detectable level (below 1 parts per billion).</p>
<figure class="align-center ">
<img alt="" src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/136829/original/image-20160907-25240-1xu40mp.png?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&fit=clip" srcset="https://images.theconversation.com/files/136829/original/image-20160907-25240-1xu40mp.png?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=600&h=600&fit=crop&dpr=1 600w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/136829/original/image-20160907-25240-1xu40mp.png?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=600&h=600&fit=crop&dpr=2 1200w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/136829/original/image-20160907-25240-1xu40mp.png?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=600&h=600&fit=crop&dpr=3 1800w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/136829/original/image-20160907-25240-1xu40mp.png?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&h=754&fit=crop&dpr=1 754w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/136829/original/image-20160907-25240-1xu40mp.png?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=754&h=754&fit=crop&dpr=2 1508w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/136829/original/image-20160907-25240-1xu40mp.png?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=754&h=754&fit=crop&dpr=3 2262w" sizes="(min-width: 1466px) 754px, (max-width: 599px) 100vw, (min-width: 600px) 600px, 237px">
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<span class="caption">Percent of samples in the DEQ’s sentinel program that tested below the federal action level. Credit: Jonathan Stroud, Ph.D. student at UM.</span>
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<p>These low numbers provide little comfort when we don’t know which homes are at risk. Only around 30 percent of homes in Flint have had their water tested, according to government data, and these water tests do not guarantee safety; they only identify danger. Also, it is clear from the data that homes that are slower to sample their water tend to be those at much greater risk.</p>
<p>So can we find these homes? The answer is yes, to a modest degree of accuracy. We have built statistical models that profile a home based on several attributes (year of construction, location, value, size, etc.), and provide an estimate of the risk level. </p>
<figure class="align-center ">
<img alt="" src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/136936/original/image-20160907-16611-75jffp.png?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&fit=clip" srcset="https://images.theconversation.com/files/136936/original/image-20160907-16611-75jffp.png?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=600&h=836&fit=crop&dpr=1 600w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/136936/original/image-20160907-16611-75jffp.png?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=600&h=836&fit=crop&dpr=2 1200w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/136936/original/image-20160907-16611-75jffp.png?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=600&h=836&fit=crop&dpr=3 1800w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/136936/original/image-20160907-16611-75jffp.png?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&h=1051&fit=crop&dpr=1 754w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/136936/original/image-20160907-16611-75jffp.png?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=754&h=1051&fit=crop&dpr=2 1508w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/136936/original/image-20160907-16611-75jffp.png?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=754&h=1051&fit=crop&dpr=3 2262w" sizes="(min-width: 1466px) 754px, (max-width: 599px) 100vw, (min-width: 600px) 600px, 237px">
<figcaption>
<span class="caption">Based on our statistical models, we can display locations which we estimate to be at high risk of lead contamination. Credit: PhD students Guangsha Shi, Jared Webb, and others at UM.</span>
</figcaption>
</figure>
<p>The quality of these models is driven by the huge swaths of data from <a href="http://www.michigan.gov/flintwater/0,6092,7-345-76292_76294_76297---,00.html">water samples</a> submitted by residents and tested by government officials in response to the crisis. This provides us with a database of measurements that includes over 20,000 water samples covering roughly 10,000 homes in Flint since November 2015 to present. We have made our risk assessments available to government officials, and are being incorporated into an mobile application, <a href="http://www.engin.umich.edu/college/about/news/stories/2016/may/google-u-m-to-build-digital-tools-for-flint-water-crisis-2">funded by Google</a> and built by students at UM Flint, that allows Flint residents to learn of their home’s risk level.</p>
<figure class="align-center ">
<img alt="" src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/136850/original/image-20160907-25253-1s8q1le.png?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&fit=clip" srcset="https://images.theconversation.com/files/136850/original/image-20160907-25253-1s8q1le.png?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=600&h=600&fit=crop&dpr=1 600w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/136850/original/image-20160907-25253-1s8q1le.png?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=600&h=600&fit=crop&dpr=2 1200w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/136850/original/image-20160907-25253-1s8q1le.png?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=600&h=600&fit=crop&dpr=3 1800w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/136850/original/image-20160907-25253-1s8q1le.png?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&h=754&fit=crop&dpr=1 754w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/136850/original/image-20160907-25253-1s8q1le.png?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=754&h=754&fit=crop&dpr=2 1508w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/136850/original/image-20160907-25253-1s8q1le.png?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=754&h=754&fit=crop&dpr=3 2262w" sizes="(min-width: 1466px) 754px, (max-width: 599px) 100vw, (min-width: 600px) 600px, 237px">
<figcaption>
<span class="caption">Younger properties have lower lead levels, on average and based on the 90th percentile (blue line). There were 8 percent of tests above federal action level 15 ppb (dotted red), and still some well above 150 ppb and even 1000 ppb. The highest 0.5 percent of samples are not shown.</span>
</figcaption>
</figure>
<p>These statistical models not only provide predictions; they also give a better understanding of the problems. This has much broader implications, as these factors predicting lead may generalize beyond Flint.</p>
<p>The data suggest that lead contamination is associated with a number of factors; older homes tend to be at greater risk, for instance, as are those of lower home value. Lower-value homes also tend to be those with the lowest rates of water sampling. Additionally, while the highest readings are geographically scattered, the homes predicted to be at high risk tend to cluster in specific neighborhoods. </p>
<h2>Flint’s lead pipe records are spotty and noisy, but statistical methods can significantly fill the gap</h2>
<p>Media reports and political efforts have continued to focus on the so-called “water service lines” that connect each house to the distribution system in the street. The assumption is that homes with lead service lines are most at risk for lead exposure and poisoning. As a result, much of the attention has been on locating and replacing these lines. </p>
<p>The Michigan legislature has allocated over US$25 million toward replacing the harmful lines, beginning with a <a href="http://www.detroitnews.com/story/news/local/michigan/2016/08/31/flint-mayor-visits-homes-water-line-replacements/89657488/">pilot phase of roughly 250 homes</a>. This effort is being headed up by a team under <a href="http://michiganradio.org/post/flint-mayor-unveils-ambitious-plan-replace-all-lead-drinking-water-lines-one-year#stream/0">National Guard Brig. Gen. Michael McDaniel</a>.</p>
<p>The problem, however, is not only with lines made out of lead material: Lead particulate can accumulate on the walls of corroded galvanized steel pipes. Pipes made of copper or plastic, on the other hand, are generally considered to be safe. </p>
<p>But there are immediate challenges with the line replacement program. And the most obvious is: Where are these dangerous pipes? </p>
<p>The city, unfortunately, did not maintain consistent records on service line installations and materials. But city officials eventually found, after some searching, a set of maps with handwritten annotations (last updated in 1984), and these records were digitized by a <a href="http://www.mlive.com/news/ann-arbor/index.ssf/2016/03/u-m_flint_professor_says_expos.html">UM Flint research team lead by Professor Marty Kaufman</a>. These appeared to identify the material of the service lines for most home parcels in Flint. </p>
<figure class="align-center zoomable">
<a href="https://images.theconversation.com/files/136645/original/image-20160905-4758-1c59n81.png?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=1000&fit=clip"><img alt="" src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/136645/original/image-20160905-4758-1c59n81.png?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&fit=clip" srcset="https://images.theconversation.com/files/136645/original/image-20160905-4758-1c59n81.png?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=600&h=899&fit=crop&dpr=1 600w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/136645/original/image-20160905-4758-1c59n81.png?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=600&h=899&fit=crop&dpr=2 1200w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/136645/original/image-20160905-4758-1c59n81.png?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=600&h=899&fit=crop&dpr=3 1800w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/136645/original/image-20160905-4758-1c59n81.png?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&h=1130&fit=crop&dpr=1 754w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/136645/original/image-20160905-4758-1c59n81.png?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=754&h=1130&fit=crop&dpr=2 1508w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/136645/original/image-20160905-4758-1c59n81.png?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=754&h=1130&fit=crop&dpr=3 2262w" sizes="(min-width: 1466px) 754px, (max-width: 599px) 100vw, (min-width: 600px) 600px, 237px"></a>
<figcaption>
<span class="caption">Using paper records, researchers were able to get a rough idea of what type of material – lead, copper or plastic – was used to bring water service to home.</span>
<span class="attribution"><span class="license">Author provided</span></span>
</figcaption>
</figure>
<p>How complete and accurate are these records? Unfortunately, not very. For over 30 percent of homes, either there are missing labels or the records disagree with a home inspection of a portion of the service line.</p>
<p>We can again fill in gaps with the help of algorithms and data. Looking for patterns in the existing records, statistical tools can provide a reasonable “educated guess” as to the type of material in a home’s service line. We have been working directly with Gen. Michael McDaniel’s line replacement team, providing statistical estimates of where lead pipes are most likely to be found, and this has guided their targeting of replacement resources. </p>
<p>Our recommendations are adapting to incoming data, using techniques applied in online advertising experiments or clinical trials, to identify the risky homes quickly and efficiently.</p>
<figure class="align-center zoomable">
<a href="https://images.theconversation.com/files/136831/original/image-20160907-25240-8iwxkr.png?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=1000&fit=clip"><img alt="" src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/136831/original/image-20160907-25240-8iwxkr.png?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&fit=clip" srcset="https://images.theconversation.com/files/136831/original/image-20160907-25240-8iwxkr.png?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=600&h=234&fit=crop&dpr=1 600w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/136831/original/image-20160907-25240-8iwxkr.png?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=600&h=234&fit=crop&dpr=2 1200w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/136831/original/image-20160907-25240-8iwxkr.png?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=600&h=234&fit=crop&dpr=3 1800w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/136831/original/image-20160907-25240-8iwxkr.png?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&h=294&fit=crop&dpr=1 754w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/136831/original/image-20160907-25240-8iwxkr.png?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=754&h=294&fit=crop&dpr=2 1508w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/136831/original/image-20160907-25240-8iwxkr.png?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=754&h=294&fit=crop&dpr=3 2262w" sizes="(min-width: 1466px) 754px, (max-width: 599px) 100vw, (min-width: 600px) 600px, 237px"></a>
<figcaption>
<span class="caption">Professors Schwartz (left) and Abernethy (right) at a service line replacement site in Flint, Michigan.</span>
</figcaption>
</figure>
<p>Our machine learning techniques, which utilize all of the available city data, parcel records and a database of over 3,000 inspection reports, are able to estimate line materials with better than 80 percent accuracy. We find, for instance, that houses built in the 1920s to 1940s are many times more likely than those built after 1960 to have lead in their service line. Our guesses aren’t perfect by any means, but estimates of this level can save millions of dollars on recovery efforts. </p>
<h2>Home service lines may not be the largest contributor of lead</h2>
<p>Despite the huge media attention focused on the service lines, one of the major takeaways from our analyses is that these service lines may not be the major driver of the lead in Flint’s drinking water. Yes, it is the case that those homes with copper service lines have lower lead levels, on average, than those with lead in their service line. But when you look closely at the water testing data, the differences are much smaller than you might think. </p>
<p>While it is difficult to determine with certainty due to the spotty records, what we have found is that large spikes of lead occur in homes with and without lead service lines. This suggests a large fraction of the dangerously high lead readings are probably not being driven by the service line material but instead by other factors. <a href="https://theconversation.com/the-science-behind-the-flint-water-crisis-corrosion-of-pipes-erosion-of-trust-53776">Environmental engineers who study these problems</a> report that lead can leach from several sources, including the home’s interior plumbing, faucet fixtures and aging pipe solder. </p>
<figure class="align-center ">
<img alt="" src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/133163/original/image-20160804-493-ob1jpl.png?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&fit=clip" srcset="https://images.theconversation.com/files/133163/original/image-20160804-493-ob1jpl.png?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=600&h=300&fit=crop&dpr=1 600w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/133163/original/image-20160804-493-ob1jpl.png?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=600&h=300&fit=crop&dpr=2 1200w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/133163/original/image-20160804-493-ob1jpl.png?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=600&h=300&fit=crop&dpr=3 1800w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/133163/original/image-20160804-493-ob1jpl.png?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&h=377&fit=crop&dpr=1 754w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/133163/original/image-20160804-493-ob1jpl.png?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=754&h=377&fit=crop&dpr=2 1508w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/133163/original/image-20160804-493-ob1jpl.png?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=754&h=377&fit=crop&dpr=3 2262w" sizes="(min-width: 1466px) 754px, (max-width: 599px) 100vw, (min-width: 600px) 600px, 237px">
<figcaption>
<span class="caption">We can look at homes that, based on records and home inspections, appear to have copper-only service lines versus those containing some lead. We plot the distribution of the lead readings for water samples from these two home categories.</span>
</figcaption>
</figure>
<p>What we can conclude is that citizens as well as policymakers may need to widen their focus beyond the service line materials and consider alternative efforts to address other sources of lead. Service line replacement is certainly a necessary part of the solution, but it will not be sufficient. </p>
<p>Toward solving the broader problem, data and statistical tools can help greatly reduce risks at much lower cost, and a data-oriented understanding of the problems in Flint can guide efforts to address <a href="https://theconversation.com/is-lead-in-water-a-problem-beyond-flint-we-dont-do-the-testing-to-find-out-54012">lead concerns in other regions</a> as well. </p>
<p><em>For more information about getting water filters and testing your water, visit <a href="http://www.michigan.gov/flintwater/0,6092,7-345-76292_76294_76296---,00.html">michigan.gov/flintwater/ </a></em></p><img src="https://counter.theconversation.com/content/62525/count.gif" alt="The Conversation" width="1" height="1" />
<p class="fine-print"><em><span>Jacob Abernethy receives funding from the National Science Foundation and Google.org. </span></em></p><p class="fine-print"><em><span>Eric Schwartz does not work for, consult, own shares in or receive funding from any company or organization that would benefit from this article, and has disclosed no relevant affiliations beyond their academic appointment.</span></em></p>By tapping into diverse data sources in Flint, researchers can predict vulnerable homes and even have found that home water service lines may not be the biggest contributor to lead poisoning.Jacob Abernethy, Assistant Professor, University of MichiganEric Schwartz, Assistant Professor of Marketing, Ross School of Business, University of MichiganLicensed as Creative Commons – attribution, no derivatives.tag:theconversation.com,2011:article/623852016-07-25T17:38:19Z2016-07-25T17:38:19ZThe science of groundwater sampling needs a dose of honesty<figure><img src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/131375/original/image-20160721-32619-z31s0o.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=496&fit=clip" /><figcaption><span class="caption">Sampling is a powerful scientific tool - when it's used honestly.</span> <span class="attribution"><span class="source">Shutterstock</span></span></figcaption></figure><p>Sampling – the collection and analysis of a representative mass like water, ore or soil – has evolved enormously since French chemist <a href="https://global.britannica.com/biography/Pierre-Gy">Pierre Gy</a> penned his work on the subject in the early 1950s.</p>
<p>Today sampling is applied in all sorts of fields: pharmaceuticals, mining, agriculture, engineering and numerous other branches of the natural and applied sciences. A representative mass from what’s known as the lot – the larger mass – is collected and assessed. This allows us to understand what the lot’s components and properties are, and is a tool for interpreting it. In mining, for example, scientists sample a body of ore to see how big the lot is. Then they can decide how deeply it can or should be mined.</p>
<p>At least one field is lagging behind when it comes to using the application of sampling as a science. This is the discipline of <a href="https://iah.org/">hydrogeology</a>, the branch of geology that studies groundwater and water that flows below ground. Groundwater, which is my research focus, is about 150 years old as a science and is still evolving.</p>
<p>Sampling has helped hydrogeologists to understand multiple aspects of their science. But recently it’s become clear that some water researchers are <a href="https://books.google.co.za/books?id=PAfMBQAAQBAJ&pg=PA227&lpg=PA227&dq=water+sampling+and+ignoring+data&source=bl&ots=FdWGD1Zbd9&sig=kUzpj8-0B73544Gs4ZoEjL8p-00&hl=en&sa=X&ved=0ahUKEwjs0aCEzYbOAhXhBcAKHcjdA_MQ6AEINzAE#v=onepage&q=water%20sampling%20and%20ignoring%20data&f=false">ignoring the evidence</a> offered by sampling if it doesn’t fit their preconceived notions. This practice must be nipped in the bud: honest, open, truthful science should always be the aim.</p>
<h2>The science of sampling</h2>
<p>A good example of sampling bias is when a scientist expects certain results from a particular area – then omits results that seem anomalous or don’t fit his “professional opinion”. He expects a certain result, doesn’t get it, and simply ignores what the sampling evidence says. He doesn’t even further analyse the anomalies or try to explain them. This can be hugely dangerous, as the story of Flint, Michigan’s <a href="http://fivethirtyeight.com/features/what-went-wrong-in-flint-water-crisis-michigan/">toxic water</a> proves. There, employees from the Department of Environmental Quality ignored samples that showed how deadly the water was.</p>
<p>One of the gaps in the process comes once samples have been collected. Scientists are only involved in the first part of the process. They draw water from a river using proper equipment; the sample is then carefully preserved and transported to a laboratory in such a way that it retains its integrity.</p>
<p>Then they step back.</p>
<p>Samples are tested behind closed lab doors, usually by an analytical chemist. Hydrologists rarely get involved in the testing process. They just receive the results. And this is when the problems can begin: a scientist faced with anomalous results must decide whether to omit these or report them when writing up their findings.</p>
<p>This is clearly an ethical issue. One school of thought suggests that anomalous samples – those that don’t “meet the grade” should just be ignored. This pressure is <a href="http://onlinelibrary.wiley.com/doi/10.1111/j.1745-6584.2007.00351.x/full">driven by journals</a>, many of which prefer to publish data that fits existing models than any which throws up anomalies. It’s a little like people only wanting to see photographs of pretty children rather than ugly babies; nobody wants their set ideas about something challenged.</p>
<p>There’s room for a lot of creativity and innovation to solve the problems I’ve described here. </p>
<h2>Science must be honest and open</h2>
<p>For starters, I believe that sampling as a science needs to be integrated into the field of groundwater. This will mean it can be taught better and standards developed so that hydrogeologists’ sampling techniques and outputs improve. Ultimately this sets up a space in which hydrogeologists’ biases – which they carry even as knowledgeable individuals in their fields – can be dislodged with proper quantitative analysis.</p>
<p>Crucially, scientists need to stop succumbing to peer review pressure; there’s no value in looking into data just to make it fit the norm. There’s also no reason to accept substandard results in the rush to publish. Science needs to be honest, open and able to supply the truth: even if that doesn’t involve the results we want.</p><img src="https://counter.theconversation.com/content/62385/count.gif" alt="The Conversation" width="1" height="1" />
<p class="fine-print"><em><span>Gaathier Mahed does not work for, consult, own shares in or receive funding from any company or organisation that would benefit from this article, and has disclosed no relevant affiliations beyond their academic appointment.</span></em></p>Some water researchers are ignoring the evidence offered by sampling if it doesn’t fit their preconceived notions. But science should always be honest and open.Gaathier Mahed, Porous Media Scientist and Lecturer, North-West UniversityLicensed as Creative Commons – attribution, no derivatives.tag:theconversation.com,2011:article/557892016-03-08T11:49:12Z2016-03-08T11:49:12ZWhat the Flint water scandal says about US politics in 2016<figure><img src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/114260/original/image-20160308-22129-s2uk7j.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=496&fit=clip" /><figcaption><span class="caption">A troubled town.</span> <span class="attribution"><a class="source" href="https://www.flickr.com/photos/michigancommunities/9550280862/in/photolist-fxVFLS-bY2woC-u7QcYw-bY2p6s-bY2ncq-bY3dHQ-bY3a2y-bY3axy-bY3cmN-fxFwqg-bY3dgm-fxVFjQ-bFeuuC-8iu4kj-bU9pDz-fxVEVJ-fxFrae-fxFqmi-fxVKCy-fxVMQU-bY3bxw-fxFwaa-fxFpwe-fxVNEb-fxFquH-fxFt4r-fxFvq6-fxFtUT-fxVLqj-fxFuiK-fxVJwb-fxVLFL-fxFvTp-fxVGW9-fxFwTT-fxFriR-fxFs5V-fxFvxe-fxFvEi-fxFttH-fxVKUG-fxVJrw-fxFwYg-fxVMb5-fxVKfQ-fxVFxG-fxVLPo-fxVHFo-fxFrDV-fxVGLs">Michigan Municipal Leage via Flickr</a>, <a class="license" href="http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc-nd/4.0/">CC BY-NC-ND</a></span></figcaption></figure><p>As the US 2016 presidential election rumbles on, the city of Flint, Michigan has become a national symbol of inequality and government failure. It first <a href="http://www.theguardian.com/environment/2016/jan/16/flints-water-crisis-what-went-wrong">inadvertently poisoned thousands of its residents</a> with lead in their water supply – including many children vulnerable to lasting developmental damage – and then responded to their complaints with a slowness that looks to many like sheer negligence. </p>
<p>The seeds of disaster were sown in April 2014, when the city <a href="http://www.mlive.com/news/flint/index.ssf/2014/04/closing_the_valve_on_history_f.html">switched its water supply to draw from the Flint River</a> while awaiting the completion of a new regional water treatment system. By switching temporarily to the river, it could begin saving immediately on the $21m cost of paying nearby Detroit for water, as it had done until that point. </p>
<p>This decision was made in the context of a severe municipal financial crisis. After a long period of economic decline and falling population, the Republican governor of Michigan, Rick Snyder, had placed the city’s near-bankrupt finances under the control of an “<a href="http://fortune.com/2016/02/18/michigan-public-act-436-flint/">emergency manager</a>” with almost total power to implement cuts.</p>
<p>There immediately were signs of serious problems. Residents complained that the water they were now receiving was discoloured and noxious. It turns out that there was indeed a serious threat to public health: the inadequately treated water from the Flint was so corrosive that it was eating into the ageing pipes delivering it to homes, allowing lead to enter the water at dangerous levels in some districts. Lead poisoning in children can cause irreparable and lifelong developmental problems, so speed was therefore of the essence in identifying the problem and warning those affected.</p>
<p>Unfortunately, the state’s Department of Environmental Quality <a href="http://www.detroitnews.com/story/news/michigan/flint-water-crisis/2016/02/03/flint-water-congressional-hearing/79728072/">insisted for months</a> that residents’ safety concerns were unjustified, and the state government downplayed the necessity of action even as complaints continued to pour in. The state only admitted there was a problem when outside scientists from the university Virginia Tech conducted a <a href="http://flintwaterstudy.org/about-page/about-us/">study</a> that found dangerously elevated lead levels in homes. </p>
<p>With the problem laid bare and any further denial untenable, the city <a href="http://www.mlive.com/news/flint/index.ssf/2015/10/flint_reconnecting_to_detroit.html">switched its water supply back to Detroit</a>, but it still cannot not guarantee the safety of water flowing through the damaged pipes, or if or when those pipes might be replaced. For the moment, the state has made <a href="http://www.abc12.com/flintwaterworries/headlines/Flint-water-resource-sites-365175551.html">water filters, bottled water, and testing kits</a> available to residents. The long-term consequences of those poisoned during the extended period when action was delayed remain to be seen.</p>
<p>The political fallout from the crisis has been substantial – and has also been sharply divided along party lines. </p>
<h2>Back and forth</h2>
<p>A number of state officials responsible for water safety have left their posts, but Governor Snyder has <a href="http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/election-us-2016-35747877">defied all calls to resign</a>, accepting responsibility for addressing the crisis but not for causing it. How much he and his office knew about Flint residents’ complaints, when they knew it, and the extent to which evidence supported them remains a matter of claim and counterclaim. </p>
<p>At the national level, the Republican candidates have sought to minimise comment and contact with the issue. In their most recent debate, held in Detroit, Senator Marco Rubio went so far as to say that “<a href="http://www.mlive.com/politics/index.ssf/2016/03/truth_squad_rubio_gets_warning.html">this should not be a partisan issue</a>”, noting that he wanted to “give the governor credit” for taking responsibility for the issue, and criticising Democrats for “politicising” events in Flint.</p>
<p>Both Democratic candidates, on the other hand, <a href="http://edition.cnn.com/2016/02/25/politics/bernie-sanders-flint-michigan-water/">visited the city</a> after the scandal broke – Hillary Clinton <a href="http://www.huffingtonpost.com/entry/hillary-clinton-flint-water-crisis_us_56b7857ee4b01d80b246ac9f">got there first</a>, in early February – to show solidarity with those affected. </p>
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<p>In their debate in the city on March 6, both Democratic candidates embraced the outrage of Flint residents at the way government had failed them, and called for the governor’s resignation and a no-expense-spared approach to rectifying the ongoing problem.</p>
<p>These starkly contrasting responses from the parties reflect the same dynamics that likely led to the suffering of Flint in the first place. </p>
<p>The city’s residents are <a href="http://www.census.gov/quickfacts/table/PST045215/2629000">mostly African-American</a> and <a href="http://www.msnbc.com/interactives/geography-of-poverty/ne.html">more than 40% of them are poor</a>, meaning that they’re as far as can be outside the Republican Party tent. Many reasonably believe that this (along with the standard inertia and reluctance to admit fault common to large institutions) is what led the state government to ignore, downplay and marginalise the legitimate fears of residents, even as evidence mounted and the urgency of the situation became clear. </p>
<p>Put simply, if the same circumstances had affected a whiter, wealthier area, there is little doubt that the response would have been very different.</p>
<p>For the Democrats, the African-American vote is a decisive part of their coalition at state and national level. Indeed, Clinton’s ability to win large majorities of black primary voters is the <a href="http://www.politico.com/magazine/story/2016/03/why-black-voters-dont-feel-the-bern-213707">single largest factor driving her lead over Bernie Sanders</a> in the contest. Both Democrats know they need voters like the African-Americans of Flint to win the nomination, and that whoever runs in the general election will need high turnout among that group to prevail. </p>
<p>Republicans, on the other hand, have all but written off any prospect of winning many votes from that demographic quarter. With the exception of Snyder, scrambling for his political survival, they feel no need to appeal to such voters or engage directly with their concerns. Such is the polarised politics of 2016 America.</p><img src="https://counter.theconversation.com/content/55789/count.gif" alt="The Conversation" width="1" height="1" />
<p class="fine-print"><em><span>Adam Quinn has previously received funding from the Economic and Social Research Council.</span></em></p>A lead poisoning crisis caused by corroded pipes has made Flint, Michigan a symbol of American inequality.Adam Quinn, Senior Lecturer in International Politics, University of BirminghamLicensed as Creative Commons – attribution, no derivatives.tag:theconversation.com,2011:article/540122016-03-01T11:20:56Z2016-03-01T11:20:56ZIs lead in water a problem beyond Flint? We don’t do the testing to find out<p>Public uproar over lead poisoning in children due to the ongoing water crisis in Flint, Michigan, has dominated the news cycle this winter. The deck was already stacked against kids growing up in Flint. And due to a decision by the city’s emergency manager to start using the Flint River as a municipal water source in April 2014, there has been a <a href="http://ajph.aphapublications.org/doi/abs/10.2105/AJPH.2015.303003">dramatic increase</a> in the number of children who will be living with the effects of lead toxicity from tainted water. </p>
<p>Lead contamination in Flint’s water is a true public health emergency, and there are still no clear solutions. But is Flint an anomaly, or does it sound the alarm to a much bigger, systemic lead problem? </p>
<p>The unfolding story in Flint has left people across the country wondering if lead poisoning is a problem in their own community. As primary care doctors, we wanted to understand how widespread lead poisoning is in America. What we learned was surprising. It’s very hard – if not impossible – to find out how widespread this problem is in the United States today.</p>
<h2>Lead testing standards vary from state to state</h2>
<p>Work by <a href="http://ajph.aphapublications.org/doi/abs/10.2105/AJPH.2015.303003">Dr. Mona Hanna-Attisha</a>, the pediatrician in Flint who initially called attention to this issue, found that the number of children with blood lead levels greater than five micrograms per deciliter doubled since Flint switched its water source. That level is the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention’s (CDC) cutoff for elevated blood lead levels.</p>
<p>To figure out if Flint is an outlier or representative of a broader problem, we need to find out which communities in the U.S. also have many children with elevated blood lead levels. That means we need to compare pediatric lead toxicity between communities across the entire country. </p>
<p>Unfortunately, this is not as straightforward as one might think. In fact, we learned it’s not even feasible to do, because lead screening and reporting guidelines vary by state, and rates of lead screening across states are dramatically different. In some cases, the data <a href="http://www.vox.com/2016/2/17/11034642/lead-poisoning-flint-statistics-data">just aren’t available</a>.</p>
<p>We can estimate the rates of lead testing across the nation, though. To do this, we aggregated <a href="http://www.cdc.gov/nceh/lead/data/national.htm">publicly available data</a> from the CDC and individual state Department of Health websites. We took the number of children screened in the most recent year available and divided by the total population of children under six in each state. However, this means that in some states the percentage of children who were screened for lead may be underestimated (i.e., a child may have been tested for lead in an earlier year and not tested again). </p>
<p>As you can see in the map below, rates of lead testing vary quite a bit.</p>
<figure class="align-center ">
<img alt="" src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/113292/original/image-20160229-4076-1tqrg90.PNG?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&fit=clip" srcset="https://images.theconversation.com/files/113292/original/image-20160229-4076-1tqrg90.PNG?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=600&h=388&fit=crop&dpr=1 600w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/113292/original/image-20160229-4076-1tqrg90.PNG?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=600&h=388&fit=crop&dpr=2 1200w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/113292/original/image-20160229-4076-1tqrg90.PNG?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=600&h=388&fit=crop&dpr=3 1800w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/113292/original/image-20160229-4076-1tqrg90.PNG?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&h=487&fit=crop&dpr=1 754w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/113292/original/image-20160229-4076-1tqrg90.PNG?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=754&h=487&fit=crop&dpr=2 1508w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/113292/original/image-20160229-4076-1tqrg90.PNG?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=754&h=487&fit=crop&dpr=3 2262w" sizes="(min-width: 1466px) 754px, (max-width: 599px) 100vw, (min-width: 600px) 600px, 237px">
<figcaption>
<span class="caption">Percent of children under six years old screened for lead toxicity in the United States. Data were collected from the most recent screening reports from the CDC or state health department sources. States without data available do not report data on the number of children screened for lead toxicity in their state.</span>
<span class="attribution"><span class="source">Nicole Gergen and Tammy Chang, CC BY-NC-ND</span></span>
</figcaption>
</figure>
<p>For example, in <a href="http://www.mass.gov/eohhs/gov/departments/dph/programs/environmental-health/exposure-topics/lead/child-health/test-and-treat/">Massachusetts</a>, all children must be tested twice before age three. Children living in high-risk neighborhoods are tested again at age four. With this legal mandate, Massachusetts has the highest rate of pediatric lead screening in the country, with 47 percent of children under six years old screened in 2014. Similar to Massachusetts, 17 other states require all children to have blood lead testing done before age six. </p>
<p>By contrast, less than five percent of children under age six were screened in <a href="http://chfs.ky.gov/NR/rdonlyres/A39F9BE2-A6A6-4FFE-A3D9-2D2326AA7C28/0/DPHGuidelinesforBloodLeadScreeningandManagementofElevatedBloodLeadLevels2012.pdf">Kentucky</a> in 2014. Kentucky requires only “at-risk” children, including those eligible for Medicaid, those living in certain zip codes or those who meet high-risk criteria based on a lead paint exposure questionnaire, <a href="http://chfs.ky.gov/NR/rdonlyres/894A7D46-2E98-4CA6-B30E-4BE48B465FF7/0/LEADPoisoningVerbalRiskAssessmentQuestionnaireMarch2014.pdf">be screened.</a> Kentucky is one of 27 states that use a targeted blood lead screening strategy.</p>
<p>In all, 44 states either require that all kids be tested or use targeted screening protocols. Other states have no formal screening protocol at all. </p>
<p>However, looking at both CDC data and state health department sources, we could find data about blood level testing for only 35 states. Fifteen states – including those that require testing of some kind and those that don’t – don’t publicly report these data.</p>
<p>Lead toxicity is likely not an emergency in most communities, but we don’t really know. Wide variation in screening guidelines and dismally low pediatric lead screening rates at the state and national level likely mask the true distribution of lead toxicity in the U.S. that is actually happening at the community level.</p>
<p>Based on the data we have, it is difficult to tell if the rate of lead toxicity in Flint represents a true outlier, or if other communities are quietly struggling with lead epidemics of similar magnitude. </p>
<figure class="align-center ">
<img alt="" src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/109843/original/image-20160201-32254-1mpyhyg.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&fit=clip" srcset="https://images.theconversation.com/files/109843/original/image-20160201-32254-1mpyhyg.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=600&h=399&fit=crop&dpr=1 600w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/109843/original/image-20160201-32254-1mpyhyg.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=600&h=399&fit=crop&dpr=2 1200w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/109843/original/image-20160201-32254-1mpyhyg.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=600&h=399&fit=crop&dpr=3 1800w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/109843/original/image-20160201-32254-1mpyhyg.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&h=501&fit=crop&dpr=1 754w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/109843/original/image-20160201-32254-1mpyhyg.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=754&h=501&fit=crop&dpr=2 1508w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/109843/original/image-20160201-32254-1mpyhyg.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=754&h=501&fit=crop&dpr=3 2262w" sizes="(min-width: 1466px) 754px, (max-width: 599px) 100vw, (min-width: 600px) 600px, 237px">
<figcaption>
<span class="caption">Water testing isn’t routine.</span>
<span class="attribution"><a class="source" href="http://www.shutterstock.com/pic-210713029/stock-photo-water-tap-and-droplets.html?src=qtpKTOxsALi_ah0mSlIUdQ-1-3">Faucet image via www.shutterstock.com.</a></span>
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</figure>
<h2>Looking through the lens of Flint</h2>
<p>Targeted lead screening protocols are different in every state, but they uniformly recommend testing children who are at high risk for <a href="http://www.epa.gov/sites/production/files/documents/parent_checklist3.pdf">exposure to lead paint products</a> – usually low-income children living in older homes with peeling paint. Although lead paint was <a href="http://www.cpsc.gov/en/Recalls/1977/CPSC-Announces-Final-Ban-On-Lead-Containing-Paint/">banned</a> in 1978, lead paint used in homes built before this regulation went into effect is known to pose a lead poisoning risk to children.</p>
<p>When testing identifies a child with an elevated blood lead level, <a href="https://www.gpo.gov/fdsys/pkg/FR-1996-08-29/pdf/96-21954.pdf">EPA and state protocols</a> recommend a home lead hazard assessment which usually focuses on exposure to lead paint. If lead paint is detected, steps for lead paint removal in the home are recommended.</p>
<p>At this point in time, there is no governmental recommendation to routinely check for lead-contaminated water when a child is found to have an elevated blood lead level.</p>
<p>If lead is contaminating the drinking water in communities outside of Flint, we might not be catching kids with lead poisoning from the water because our current targeted lead screening protocols do not consider water to be a risk. By focusing mostly on lead paint exposure, we miss possible lead exposure associated with water source contamination.</p>
<p>Flint is only <a href="https://theconversation.com/piping-as-poison-the-flint-water-crisis-and-americas-toxic-infrastructure-53473">one of many postindustrial cities</a> with an outdated network of lead water pipes. The water crisis in Flint has taught us that confirming water safety at the treatment plant does not necessarily ensure safe water in the homes of our patients. We don’t routinely collect water lead levels in homes of children who have elevated blood lead levels, so we don’t know if lead contaminated drinking water is part of the reason why their lead levels are high. </p>
<h2>States should follow their own testing guidelines</h2>
<p>A first step toward a better understanding of lead poisoning in the U.S. is for states to promote adherence to their current lead screening guidelines. </p>
<p>Then when a child with elevated blood lead levels is identified, states should require home water lead level data be collected and reported to the state. </p>
<p>If elevated home water lead levels are in fact contributing to lead poisoning in other communities, besides removing the source of the lead, it will be important for states to retool their targeted screening protocols to better address water as a potential lead poisoning risk factor. </p>
<p>The tragedy in Flint was human-made. It is time to reexamine our policies and practices around lead exposure so that what happened in Flint is an isolated incident rather than a harbinger of more preventable tragedies that may be silently unfolding across the country right now.</p><img src="https://counter.theconversation.com/content/54012/count.gif" alt="The Conversation" width="1" height="1" />
<p class="fine-print"><em><span>The authors do not work for, consult, own shares in or receive funding from any company or organization that would benefit from this article, and have disclosed no relevant affiliations beyond their academic appointment.</span></em></p>The Flint water crisis has left people across the country wondering if lead poisoning is a problem in their community. But it’s very hard to find out how widespread this problem is.Tammy Chang, Assistant Professor, Family Medicine, University of MichiganNicole Gergen, Robert Wood Johnson Clinical Scholar, Internal Medicine and Pediatrics, University of MichiganLicensed as Creative Commons – attribution, no derivatives.tag:theconversation.com,2011:article/536342016-02-03T11:09:55Z2016-02-03T11:09:55ZIn kids, even low lead levels can cause lasting harm<figure><img src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/109727/original/image-20160129-3898-1l6evrr.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=496&fit=clip" /><figcaption><span class="caption">Lead exposure is more common than you think.</span> <span class="attribution"><span class="source">CDC/Dawn Arlotta</span></span></figcaption></figure><p>The recent firestorm over lead exposure from drinking water in Flint, Michigan is a reminder of the enduring risk posed by environmental lead. While we can all agree that it is unacceptable for children to be exposed to dangerously high levels of lead, there is less awareness of what this means. </p>
<p>Flint is just one of many cities in the country where lead exposure is a serious issue. For cities with an industrial past and much <a href="http://www.cdc.gov/nceh/lead/tips.htm">pre-1978 housing stock</a>, like Cleveland, where we work, the risks to today’s children is of continuing concern. In recent years, we and our colleagues have been examining the incidence and effects of lead exposure on young children in Cleveland and its first-ring suburbs. </p>
<figure class="align-right zoomable">
<a href="https://images.theconversation.com/files/109721/original/image-20160129-3910-hbfagf.JPG?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=1000&fit=clip"><img alt="" src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/109721/original/image-20160129-3910-hbfagf.JPG?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=237&fit=clip" srcset="https://images.theconversation.com/files/109721/original/image-20160129-3910-hbfagf.JPG?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=600&h=450&fit=crop&dpr=1 600w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/109721/original/image-20160129-3910-hbfagf.JPG?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=600&h=450&fit=crop&dpr=2 1200w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/109721/original/image-20160129-3910-hbfagf.JPG?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=600&h=450&fit=crop&dpr=3 1800w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/109721/original/image-20160129-3910-hbfagf.JPG?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&h=566&fit=crop&dpr=1 754w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/109721/original/image-20160129-3910-hbfagf.JPG?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=754&h=566&fit=crop&dpr=2 1508w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/109721/original/image-20160129-3910-hbfagf.JPG?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=754&h=566&fit=crop&dpr=3 2262w" sizes="(min-width: 1466px) 754px, (max-width: 599px) 100vw, (min-width: 600px) 600px, 237px"></a>
<figcaption>
<span class="caption">Even though lead paint was banned in 1978, many old homes still have it.</span>
<span class="attribution"><a class="source" href="https://commons.wikimedia.org/wiki/File%3ALeadPaint1.JPG">Thester11 via Wikimedia Commons</a>, <a class="license" href="http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/4.0/">CC BY</a></span>
</figcaption>
</figure>
<p>Lead is a known neurotoxin that is <a href="http://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC1257652/">associated with cognitive deficits</a> in children – <a href="http://eric.ed.gov/?id=ED509746">even at low levels of exposure</a>. In fact, reports indicate that most of the harm may occur at levels of <a href="http://www.biologicaldiversity.org/campaigns/get_the_lead_out/pdfs/health/Bellinger_2008b.pdf">exposure well below current standards</a> for concern. Though lead is no longer used in household paint and has been removed from gasoline, there is still plenty of it out there. Lead leaching into water pipes, in paint dust and chips, and soil remains a serious threat to children. </p>
<p>Children living in low-income neighborhoods, children of color and children whose families live in rental housing are statistically <a href="https://www.huduser.gov/portal/periodicals/em/fall14/highlight1.html">at the greatest risk of exposure to lead</a>. That means the children most at risk of lead exposure also disproportionately face the effects of poverty, low-resource communities and trauma.</p>
<h2>Lead’s effects never go away</h2>
<p>Often attention is focused on the number of children who have an elevated lead test result in a given year. This is an important metric, but it can mask the <a href="http://www.cdc.gov/nceh/lead/ACCLPP/meetingMinutes/lessThan10MtgMAR04.pdf">cumulative role of lead exposure</a> on child development.</p>
<p>For example, in <a href="http://www.ccbh.net/lead-level-maps">Cuyahoga County</a>, where nearly 25,000 children are tested each year, we have seen the number of children with an elevated blood lead level (above 5 micrograms per deciliter) drop from 35 percent in 2004 to 9 percent in 2013. This is a very encouraging trend showing success from public health efforts. </p>
<p>Despite the fact that the number of children with high lead level rates seems to be going down, it is important to think about the overall share of children that have ever had a positive lead test. These children carry those effects with them as they age.</p>
<p>In a recent unpublished analysis using integrated data from multiple sources, we found that fully 35 percent of children in a sample of preschool classrooms had an elevated blood lead level at some point in their lives. </p>
<p>The treatment options for children with elevated blood lead levels include dietary approaches and dealing with the effects of lead by managing sensory exposures. At greater exposures, <a href="http://pediatrics.aappublications.org/content/116/4/1036">chelation therapy</a> – in which a synthetic compound is injected into the bloodstream which binds itself to the heavy metals – can be used. Though chelation has been shown to significantly reduce blood lead levels in the short term, there is evidence of a rebound in lead levels after therapy has concluded. Also, blood lead levels do not fully capture the retention of <a href="http://www.who.int/selection_medicines/committees/expert/18/applications/4_2_LeadOralChelators.pdf">lead in bone and deep tissue</a>. </p>
<figure class="align-center ">
<img alt="" src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/109722/original/image-20160129-3905-67tthx.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&fit=clip" srcset="https://images.theconversation.com/files/109722/original/image-20160129-3905-67tthx.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=600&h=400&fit=crop&dpr=1 600w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/109722/original/image-20160129-3905-67tthx.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=600&h=400&fit=crop&dpr=2 1200w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/109722/original/image-20160129-3905-67tthx.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=600&h=400&fit=crop&dpr=3 1800w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/109722/original/image-20160129-3905-67tthx.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&h=503&fit=crop&dpr=1 754w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/109722/original/image-20160129-3905-67tthx.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=754&h=503&fit=crop&dpr=2 1508w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/109722/original/image-20160129-3905-67tthx.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=754&h=503&fit=crop&dpr=3 2262w" sizes="(min-width: 1466px) 754px, (max-width: 599px) 100vw, (min-width: 600px) 600px, 237px">
<figcaption>
<span class="caption">Kids with lead exposure start behind nonexposed kids.</span>
<span class="attribution"><a class="source" href="http://www.shutterstock.com/pic-338318210/stock-photo-smiling-kids-playing-with-modelling-clay-at-their-desk.html?src=aLBhNAKxA1a7a7-PF5YhxQ-7-20">Children image via www.shutterstock.com.</a></span>
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<h2>Long-term consequences</h2>
<p>Children exposed to lead are at elevated risk for learning delays and academic issues. We have also found that students with confirmed early childhood lead exposure have lower kindergarten readiness scores. </p>
<p>In tracking the experiences of children in our community, we find that lead-exposed children entering high-quality preschool start the year significantly behind their nonexposed peers.</p>
<p>In our ongoing research, we have found that on standardized measures these children score 10-30 percent below their peers on skills such as identifying letters, numbers and shapes. More sobering is the reality that while these children show significant progress during preschool they still finish the year, on average, below where their nonexposed peers start the preschool year. </p>
<p>This disparity is likely to grow as children age unless special efforts are made to address it. Results from Detroit show that these children are much more likely to <a href="http://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmed/23327265">experience academic challenges as they age</a>.</p>
<p>And it looks like it doesn’t take much lead to cause harm. Other research has shown that blood levels well below the current standard for intervention can also <a href="http://pediatrics.aappublications.org/content/early/2013/05/08/peds.2012-2277">cause negative effects on school readiness</a> for young children.</p>
<h2>There is no known safe level of lead exposure</h2>
<p>Until a few years ago, the federal standard for action was 10 micrograms per deciliter of blood, and in 2012 it was <a href="http://www.cdc.gov/nceh/lead/">lowered by half</a> in recognition of evidence showing a lower threshold of concern. </p>
<p>But the truth is there is no known safe level of blood lead for children, and the <a href="https://www.aap.org/en-us/about-the-aap/aap-press-room/pages/AAP-Statement-CDC-Revised-Lead-Exposure-Guidelines.aspx">American Academy of Pediatrics</a> and the <a href="http://www.cdc.gov/nceh/lead/ACCLPP/Final_Document_030712.pdf">Centers for Disease Control and Prevention</a> have said as much.</p>
<p>The medical research community has documented negative impacts on children with even lower levels of lead exposure than the current 5 micrograms per deciliters standard. With that view, we might consider every child with a confirmed nonzero lead test as at-risk. </p>
<p>Based on our analysis of lead data <a href="http://www.ccbh.net/lead-level-maps">in our county</a>, we calculate that if this standard were adopted in the U.S., our lead exposure rate for kids younger than 6 in a single year would climb from 9 percent to 3-4 times this rate.</p>
<p>Short of ensuring that every housing structure has been certified as lead-safe, parents and caregivers should be the first line of defense in keeping children from this exposure. Testing lead blood levels in children is simply too late.</p>
<p>This is akin to the TSA searching for lethal weapons after the passengers have boarded the flight and the plan has taken off. Once the lead is in the bloodstream, the damage is real and lasting for these children, and the options for response are far fewer and less effective.</p><img src="https://counter.theconversation.com/content/53634/count.gif" alt="The Conversation" width="1" height="1" />
<p class="fine-print"><em><span>Robert L Fischer receives funding from the Cleveland Department of Public Health and the Cuyahoga County Office of Early Childhood, both of which have an interest in reducing childhood lead exposure and addressing its effects. </span></em></p><p class="fine-print"><em><span>Elizabeth Anthony does not work for, consult, own shares in or receive funding from any company or organization that would benefit from this article, and has disclosed no relevant affiliations beyond their academic appointment.</span></em></p>Children exposed to lead are at elevated risk for learning delays and academic issues.Robert L. Fischer, Co-Director of the Center on Urban Poverty and Community Development, Case Western Reserve UniversityElizabeth Anthony, Research Assistant Professor, Center on Urban Poverty and Community Development, Case Western Reserve UniversityLicensed as Creative Commons – attribution, no derivatives.tag:theconversation.com,2011:article/537762016-01-28T10:46:19Z2016-01-28T10:46:19ZThe science behind the Flint water crisis: corrosion of pipes, erosion of trust<figure><img src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/109414/original/image-20160127-26778-1cxe5nw.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=496&fit=clip" /><figcaption><span class="caption">Disinfecting municipal water systems is complex, but Flint made critical errors that led to the lead poisoning crisis.</span> <span class="attribution"><a class="source" href="https://www.flickr.com/photos/thilli0207/5463160784/in/photolist-9jL8nj-5tGHSi-3erGMq-6z6ySY-ornayJ-BuC57s-aXGrHD-9Z2nQc-gxjuqa-vBGhua-dKAefi-8iEArh-hFvaJT-2LL8wx-quP8u3-fQm4XH-jKZdCd-9unXZ9-igg3Cx-qEKzoy-3AcgwW-AztdB5-4SnpJ1-quXmbZ-awDsbC-skQKoM-aprNuq-5jKD6d-5nEad5-54KXsv-oo6XG1-bguSCk-88w7ZC-6qzh81-f5BjtV-9CC6ZM-eSqjwD-6v3PZX-aZ7jbe-ymYYkJ-rpVa5N-mueLAx-niuCA5-oCTEwg-93XUNN-ctr2gy-9dpaJ4-8yJ63P-qRjhAY-9bVMwd">thilli0207/flickr</a>, <a class="license" href="http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc/4.0/">CC BY-NC</a></span></figcaption></figure><p>Flint’s recent water crisis is a stinging reminder that the infrastructure we often take for granted has many vulnerabilities. </p>
<p>The crisis also underscores the complexity of providing communities with safe, high-quality potable water. </p>
<p>Water utilities interested in using a new river water source, as the city of Flint was last year, would normally hire engineering firms to conduct detailed studies of the raw water quality and pilot studies to evaluate various water treatment process options before choosing a treatment approach. </p>
<p>As a researcher on water disinfection and professor of civil and environmental engineering, I know that a planning period of at least two to three years to get to a ribbon-cutting for such a facility is normal. The design of these systems is iterative by its nature and requires input from multiple stakeholders at various points in the design process.</p>
<p>Why is the design of a new surface water treatment facility so complex? </p>
<h2>Fateful mistakes in Flint</h2>
<p>Water quality issues in Flint began with the decision of city officials in 2014 to switch from buying treated drinking water from Detroit to treating Flint River water themselves using a city-owned treatment facility. </p>
<p>The switch was considered a <a href="http://www.detroitnews.com/story/news/michigan/flint-water-crisis/2016/01/26/ex-detroit-official-reignites-flint-water-switch-tiff/79379770/">temporary</a> money-saving “fix” to provide the city with drinking water until they were able to join a new regional system, the Karegnondi Water Authority. A 10-month, US$171,000 engineering effort was undertaken to equip the Flint plant to treat Flint River water before it was put into service. </p>
<p>Sources of drinking water supply, in general, include groundwater and surface waters, such as lakes and rivers. Among those water sources, rivers present the greatest treatment challenge. </p>
<p>Relative to groundwater, surface waters tend to contain more particles, microorganisms, organic matter, taste- and odor-causing compounds, and many types of trace contaminants. On average, surface water also tends to be more corrosive than groundwater.</p>
<p>Beyond the challenges of designing a treatment approach tailored to the source water, water quality engineers must consider myriad engineering, regulatory and financial constraints during design. </p>
<p>In recent years, the cost of chemicals used to treat water has increased at rates well above inflation. Based on a <a href="http://www.waterrf.org/PublicReportLibrary/91264.pdf">2009 report published by the Water Research Foundation</a>, the average price of phosphoric acid, a chemical that can inhibit corrosion, increased by 233 percent in 2008 alone. These anticorrosion chemicals are used to prevent lead and other metals in the pipes from leaching into the water. At the time Flint decided to treat its own water, chemical costs were still increasing.</p>
<p>Many utilities treating surface water are under pressure to look for less costly approaches to perform chemical treatment. Yet particle removal, a critical step used to treat surface waters like the Flint River, is a chemical-intensive operation. </p>
<p>Iron and aluminum salts are typically coagulants added to water supplies to help aggregate particles so they can be effectively removed through settling. There are many types of iron and aluminum coagulants, and they have different degrees of effectiveness depending upon the quality of water being treated. </p>
<p>Coagulant choice is an important design decision; therefore the choice of coagulant should not be based only on cost. For example, each coagulant has to be optimized to enhance removal of natural organic matter in the source water. If too little organic matter is removed, it will react with chlorine disinfectants in the water to form hazardous by-products.</p>
<p>A switch from sulfate-based to chloride-based aluminum or iron coagulant salts also alters the chloride-to-sulfate ratio in water. It was this ratio that Dr.<a href="http://www.vtnews.vt.edu/articles/2015/09/091415-engineering-edwardsflint.html"> Marc Edwards, a faculty member at Virginia Tech</a>, linked in 2010 to <a href="http://www.waterrf.org/publicreportlibrary/4088.pdf">higher lead concentrations</a> in vulnerable distribution systems with pipes made from lead. The Flint treatment plant relied on iron chloride coagulants, which may have contributed to the corrosivity of the water. </p>
<h2>Science of corrosion</h2>
<p>Because of Flint’s method of treating Flint River water, it experienced problems with elevated trihalomethanes, a regulated class of disinfection by-products that are known carcinogens. A domino series of causes and effects were responsible for this problem. </p>
<p>The Flint River is naturally high in corrosive chloride. Therefore, iron pipes in the water distribution system began corroding immediately after the initial switch from Detroit water. The iron that was released from the corroding pipes reacted with residual chlorine that is added to kill microorganisms, making it unavailable to function as a disinfectant. </p>
<p>Because chlorine, which reacted with the iron pipes, could not act as as disinfectant, bacteria levels spiked. When coliform bacteria were detected in distribution system water samples, water utility managers were obliged by law to increase the levels of chlorine. The higher levels of chlorine, while reducing coliform counts, led to the formation of more trihalomethanes. </p>
<figure class="align-center zoomable">
<a href="https://images.theconversation.com/files/109416/original/image-20160127-26796-dgrgjs.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=1000&fit=clip"><img alt="" src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/109416/original/image-20160127-26796-dgrgjs.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&fit=clip" srcset="https://images.theconversation.com/files/109416/original/image-20160127-26796-dgrgjs.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=600&h=398&fit=crop&dpr=1 600w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/109416/original/image-20160127-26796-dgrgjs.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=600&h=398&fit=crop&dpr=2 1200w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/109416/original/image-20160127-26796-dgrgjs.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=600&h=398&fit=crop&dpr=3 1800w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/109416/original/image-20160127-26796-dgrgjs.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&h=500&fit=crop&dpr=1 754w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/109416/original/image-20160127-26796-dgrgjs.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=754&h=500&fit=crop&dpr=2 1508w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/109416/original/image-20160127-26796-dgrgjs.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=754&h=500&fit=crop&dpr=3 2262w" sizes="(min-width: 1466px) 754px, (max-width: 599px) 100vw, (min-width: 600px) 600px, 237px"></a>
<figcaption>
<span class="caption">Water utilities need to devise treatments specific to each water source and surface water, such as rivers, requires more chemical treatment.</span>
<span class="attribution"><a class="source" href="https://www.flickr.com/photos/publicworksgroup/4138529901/in/photolist-7iH3KP-jHuPY4-5qrmz9-mCL7f-7iH3JH-A4nNnY-a9Q98z-jHLCzi-6rsC75-9NamRq-5VN5uw-7PWUZc-9Ubf4C-jHNjm1-2WAZc-9UpFm8-rujKZB-7iH45M-7T86Q2-7Gc5RC-7TbmqE-7T87i8-7TbkVQ-9ZPEh9-e3hb6T-h9RvT8-93K2zs-HM8Kr-btifsS-9ZGShB-92UX5t-h9SM82-7iH3U4-8DBBNS-awjZyX-auNKdd-93FWGc-iZqiuN-7dPiXw-7iLXtj-7iH42a-bpVnHV-jHwmkd-kW5jkZ-jHLpD8-5kx39n-9UpFxM-9UpFb4-gmHnE5-9zgzPx">publicworksgroup/flickr</a>, <a class="license" href="http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-sa/4.0/">CC BY-SA</a></span>
</figcaption>
</figure>
<p>Providing adequate disinfection while minimizing disinfection by-products is a challenge faced by most utilities even under the best of circumstances. The problems became intractable in Flint due to the excessive corrosion of the pipes that deliver water to people’s homes.</p>
<p>The science of pipe corrosion in drinking water systems is complex and not completely understood. Corrosion control occurs when naturally forming minerals deposit on pipe walls, thereby protecting the iron pipe surfaces from exposure to oxidants in the water. Changes in water quality sometimes dissolve these mineral coatings, exposing the pipe to corrosion.</p>
<p>In iron pipe systems, the released iron corrosion particles are visible, causing colored and turbid water. In older distribution systems, where lead service lines are often still in place, corrosion then releases lead and copper. Corrosion rates can be affected by many factors that are not well-understood, including the presence of bacteria that colonize the pipe wall, as well as pipe age and water flow rates.</p>
<p>Because of the uncertainties around leaching, the majority of utilities treating surface water add phosphate corrosion inhibitors to control corrosion. They devise doses based on the water industry’s experience, rather than on rigorous scientific calculations. </p>
<h2>False economies</h2>
<p>Empirical tests known as “loop tests” are commonly used to assess the effectiveness of corrosion control strategies applied to a given water distribution system. There is no record that such tests were performed in Flint. </p>
<p>A critical cost-saving <a href="https://www.cityofflint.com/wp-content/uploads/Veolia-REPORT-Flint-Water-Quality-201503121.pdf">decision</a> made by Flint not to use corrosion inhibitors, especially when water previously supplied by Detroit did contain them, should have raised concerns. Evidence to demonstrate that inhibitors were unnecessary was a minimum common-sense requirement.</p>
<p>Ignorance among utility personnel and water quality engineers of the importance of corrosion control management and its subtle linkage to decisions made elsewhere in the treatment plant unfortunately also played a role in <a href="http://www.msnbc.com/msnbc/flint-water-crisis-timeline">this story</a> of unintended consequences. </p>
<p>In many water treatment textbooks, the topic of pipeline corrosion is covered as an afterthought. Flint’s experience should serve as a siren call to the profession of water quality engineers to remedy this oversight.</p>
<p>By not adding a corrosion inhibitor, Flint was going to save <a href="http://www.detroitnews.com/story/news/politics/2016/01/21/deq-director-flint/79145696/">about $140 per day</a>. But the inestimable costs of the errors made in Flint will reverberate through the community for a long time and their magnitude will dwarf the original planned savings. </p>
<p>Replacement of Flint’s lead service lines, which is the <a href="https://theconversation.com/piping-as-poison-the-flint-water-crisis-and-americas-toxic-infrastructure-53473">only permanent solution</a> to address its lead vulnerability, is estimated to cost up to <a href="http://www.freep.com/story/news/local/michigan/2016/01/07/governor-meet-morning-flint-mayor/78402190/">$1.5 billion</a>, according to Flint’s mayor, Karen Weaver. </p>
<p>Investment of funds in infrastructure that might have made a large dent toward solving the problem permanently must now focus on monitoring, alternative water sources, point-of-use treatment filters, health costs and restoring the badly eroded trust of the community.</p>
<p>Given the complexities and uncertainties in producing safe potable drink, a nonnegotiable respect for the necessary planning and testing steps of any new system is paramount to prevent such incidents as we’ve seen in Flint. A lack of due diligence in planning will always cost more in the end.</p>
<p><em>The author acknowledges the contributions of faculty collaborators Lutgarde Raskin, Nancy Love, Glen Daigger, Michele Swanson, Krista Wigginton and Kim Hayes, who are part of a Flint water research team at the University of Michigan.</em></p><img src="https://counter.theconversation.com/content/53776/count.gif" alt="The Conversation" width="1" height="1" />
<p class="fine-print"><em><span>Terese Olson does not work for, consult, own shares in or receive funding from any company or organization that would benefit from this article, and has disclosed no relevant affiliations beyond their academic appointment.</span></em></p>Treating municipal water, particularly from rivers, is difficult technically and cash-strapped municipalities like Flint don’t always know the latest science.Terese Olson, Associate Professor of Civil and Environmental Engineering , University of MichiganLicensed as Creative Commons – attribution, no derivatives.tag:theconversation.com,2011:article/535392016-01-27T10:45:43Z2016-01-27T10:45:43ZTo help resolve the Flint water crisis, a university leans on its community<p>The tragedy of the Flint water crisis has captured national and international attention, with people expressing shock and disbelief that residents of a U.S. city in the 21st century can be denied a basic human right: access to a safe water supply. </p>
<p>Along with the intense media attention to this issue, there has been boundless and conflicting information about the cause of this crisis and what actions should be taken by those affected. How should the people of Flint minimize the damage from toxic chemicals and protect themselves now and in the future? </p>
<p>As a longtime resident of Flint and a public health scholar, I saw the need for a multifaceted approach to educate the community about the complexities of this problem and to address the grave concerns of Flint residents. </p>
<p>Distributing printed materials to parents through medical providers’ offices, Internet and social media sources does not reach all those who are seeking information. To supplement and complement those information sources, we developed a course focused on the water crisis and invited the community to attend.</p>
<p>With this new model of education, we hope to educate members of the community and at the same time, gather crucial information to inform the response to this public health crisis.</p>
<h2>Making sense in a crisis</h2>
<p>As a public health scholar at the University of Michigan-Flint since 1980, I recognized early in my career that solving public health problems requires community engagement and careful listening to the voices of those most affected by those problems. </p>
<p>This idea informs my scholarship and teaching and is continually reinforced through rich, vital, productive and longstanding partnerships with the Flint community. It’s how I think about “community” and the role that an urban-placed university should play in promoting the health and well-being of its city. </p>
<p>As the crisis unfolded, it was clear we needed a university course for students and the community to come together and address our epic crisis. We wanted to create a forum within which students and community members could come together to learn and better understand the breadth of the issues related to the crisis. </p>
<p>Before the crisis moved into the national spotlight, a Master’s of Public Health student, Marla Sievers, at the University of Michigan-Flint began investigating the toxicity of the water, looking beyond its discoloration. </p>
<p>Her interest, along with that of several prominent public health figures with close ties to the university and an epidemiologist on our faculty, prompted me to design a for-credit university course that would be available at no charge to community members. </p>
<p>The community has been flooded with information, but the information has not been synthesized in a helpful manner to answer basic questions, such as whether it’s OK to shower in your home. </p>
<h2>Demonstrating dialogue</h2>
<p>A small group of committed and interested partners began meeting biweekly beginning in October to develop the course. The community members of the planning group were absolutely essential in the development and formulation of this course.</p>
<p>We initially did some brainstorming about the issues and information that had been disseminated about the water crisis and soon realized that much of this information would not reach those who needed it most – those who do not take their children to a pediatrician, or are disinclined to read print material disseminated by government agencies in which they have lost trust. </p>
<p>We generated names of possible experts who could provide insight into each of the issues. The course will have eight two-hour classes, with the first hour dedicated to brief presentations by a panel of the experts, followed by open dialogue with the students and community residents. </p>
<p>The format allows us to address various related topics in some depth, which achieves one objective of going beyond a superficial understanding of the issues. </p>
<p>Although this course on the water crisis is unique in its scope and size, this model of bidirectional learning among the students, panel experts and community residents is an expansion of a model I developed for a Cultural Competence in Health Care course in the 1990s. </p>
<p>In that course, which addresses issues of racism and discrimination, a community partner joined me as a coinstructor to give students the opportunity to hear firsthand from an African-American instructor who experiences discrimination on a daily basis, thus making the issue “real” for more privileged students. </p>
<p>Evaluations from this earlier course continually point to the value of the interracial dialogue between the two instructors to model how sensitive topics like racism can be discussed in a constructive and respectful manner.</p>
<h2>Gathering information from the community</h2>
<p>One of the objectives of the water crisis course is to create a bidirectional dialogue between the residents and the panel experts from academia. We want the university students to observe the richness of dialogue when community resident “experts” have an opportunity to voice their concerns and share their perspectives and experiences. </p>
<p>The panel of university experts has an opportunity to hear directly from and learn from the residents affected. Such a model enables students to better appreciate the views and insights of nonacademic community residents and the depth of knowledge that they possess, which leads to valuable and respectful partnerships for the future.</p>
<p>Another objective of the course is to further enhance participants’ and attendees’ skills to unpack the layers of complexity of this crisis, encouraging them to think deeply and critically about this and other complex public health issues. </p>
<p>The full story of the Flint water crisis is still unfolding, and nearly each day new information requires a revised lens to address new issues, such as worries over an outbreak of
Legionnaires’ disease, lack of transparency from government officials, ambiguous lines of authority between federal, state and local officials, and recycling challenges related to the influx of hundreds of thousands of bottled water donated to the community.</p>
<h2>Path forward</h2>
<p>Topics that will be covered in the course include: what happened and how we got here; public health and water safety; the science of water delivery; the health implications of the water crisis; economic and social justice issues; the political backdrop to the crisis; and preparing for the next crisis.</p>
<p>At the time of this writing, the first session has just been offered. We had about 150 participants, with approximately 20 residents asking questions of the panelists and requesting that additional sessions be added. </p>
<p>An experienced and skilled moderator managed questions and comments from some impassioned and intense participants, setting a tone of inclusiveness and comfort that kept many of the attendees lingering for nearly an hour after the official end of the program.</p>
<p>The residents of Flint are still trying to understand how best to deal by the problems created by the water crisis. Connecting people from the community with experts in academia is one way to find the best path forward.</p><img src="https://counter.theconversation.com/content/53539/count.gif" alt="The Conversation" width="1" height="1" />
<p class="fine-print"><em><span>Suzanne Selig does not work for, consult, own shares in or receive funding from any company or organization that would benefit from this article, and has disclosed no relevant affiliations beyond their academic appointment.</span></em></p>The University of Michigan-Flint puts experts from academia in the same room as Flint community members, an innovative model for educating the community and forming the public health response.Suzanne Selig, Professor of Public Health and Health Sciences, University of MichiganLicensed as Creative Commons – attribution, no derivatives.tag:theconversation.com,2011:article/534732016-01-25T10:44:40Z2016-01-25T10:44:40ZPiping as poison: the Flint water crisis and America’s toxic infrastructure<figure><img src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/109070/original/image-20160123-417-15y0d9l.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=496&fit=clip" /><figcaption><span class="caption">Up until the 1940s, as much as half of U.S. water piping from main lines was made of lead. </span> <span class="attribution"><a class="source" href="https://www.flickr.com/photos/thomashawk/134723424/in/photolist-cUuzE-kqPxPf-jMqkK4-b6gyx2-cNr4H-qAGrgH-ncpbhg-dCNhjp-5zQk9f-4qVXtS-8ZP5cT-4krjnM-7MDumz-qnZxS-pPa1Ys-f97NGV-4Rf5wx-whqwQJ-8qpLP1-5GkdnK-6irr9R-4Ai1Ec-sp2tU-4krkGT-8NBPE-axWAYR-8gRZpK-6KLSnr-5KpNN5-3uRdKp-87WFQo-6CLrWd-7zTbW-BkrV7Y-auZnE4-8nAG3k-6EFWM8-5a56PU-FcobE-dp1BC-uypNKr-fNdfwk-bzkuTN-bMWEt8-BQbUjC-8KAPqZ-7UXSnQ-qDF57-a8P5o-rYcGwZ/">Thomashawk/flickr</a>, <a class="license" href="http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc/4.0/">CC BY-NC</a></span></figcaption></figure><p>As the crisis over the water in Flint, Michigan, rolls on, we’re learning more and more about the <a href="http://www.nytimes.com/2016/01/21/us/flint-michigan-lead-water-crisis.html">irresponsibility and callousness</a> of officials and politicians in charge. </p>
<p>The mix of austerity politics, <a href="http://www.nytimes.com/2016/01/22/us/a-question-of-environmental-racism-in-flint.html?_r=0">environmental racism</a> and sheer ineptitude makes for a shocking brew, yet the physical conditions that have made it literally toxic for Flint residents are neither as exceptional nor as recent as much of the media coverage suggests.</p>
<p>Long before that fateful decision two years ago to turn to the Flint River for the city’s drinking water, pipes made of lead had threaded throughout the city’s underbelly. Flint shares this historical legacy with <a href="http://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC2509614/">thousands</a> of other cities, suburbs and towns across our country, and most likely this is not the first time, even in Flint, that these pipes have conveyed tiny amounts of the toxin into homes and children. </p>
<p>Over the past few decades, our environmental laws and agencies have met with much success in curbing some of Americans’ exposure to lead, a damaging neurotoxin. Yet they have struggled to contain this continuing danger precisely because it is literally built into our water systems. </p>
<p>Given that lead has been known as a poison for centuries, why did our forebears in the 19th and early 20th centuries rely on it to carry so vital a fare as drinking water? The answer to this question explains why there are many more Flints waiting to happen. </p>
<h2>Lesser evil</h2>
<p>In the 19th and early 20th centuries, from an engineering standpoint, lead seemed superior to concrete or iron, the alternatives at the time when many municipal water systems were being built. Lead is more malleable and thus easier to bend around corners. It also lasts longer. </p>
<p>Doctors offered virtually no resistance to this decision. After all, they themselves were turning to lead to <a href="http://babel.hathitrust.org/cgi/pt?id=hvd.hc33g8;view=1up;seq=202">treat diarrhea</a> or <a href="http://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC2319858/">trigger abortions</a>. They recognized only those symptoms of lead poisoning that by today’s standards seem extreme: the severe stomach aches, muscle weakness, kidney failure, seizures and even death that can ensue when lead in the blood rises past <a href="http://wonder.cdc.gov/wonder/prevguid/p0000017/p0000017.asp">60 micrograms per deciliter – 12 times the current standard</a>. </p>
<p>While lead pipes did occasionally produce <a href="http://ajph.aphapublications.org/doi/pdf/10.2105/AJPH.26.8.778">“epidemics” this dramatic</a>, health officials remained far more worried about diseases like typhoid, which they knew piped-in water could prevent. As a result, <a href="http://www.nber.org/papers/w9549.pdf">as much as half</a> of the water pipes laid in America’s burgeoning metropolitan areas during the early 20th century were made of lead. </p>
<p>It is also worth noting that lead pipe made up a relatively minor portion of the burgeoning flow of this toxic metal into early 20th-century factories, homes (through paint pigments) and automobiles (through leaded gasoline). </p>
<p><a href="http://www.ila-lead.org/UserFiles/File/factbook/annex.pdf">Spurring it along, the lead industry</a> grew rich and powerful. In the time before the advent of the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC) or the Environmental Protection Agency (EPA), it sponsored its own health research. Some investigators even advanced a thesis that levels of lead in the blood and environment that, in retrospect, <a href="http://jama.jamanetwork.com/article.aspx?articleid=256421">seem quite high, were “normal,”</a> a not-so-worrisome condition of modern life. </p>
<p>In fact, the health and behavioral effects of lead from the early to the mid-20th century, as suggested by recent extrapolations from our current knowledge, were likely enormous. It’s estimated leaded pipe alone <a href="http://www.nber.org/papers/w16480">increased infant mortality by as much as 30 percent</a> in some cities, and led to <a href="http://scholar.harvard.edu/jfeigenbaum/publications/effects-lead-crime-rates-evidence-fromhistorical-urban-data">as much as a 25 percent rise in homicides</a>.</p>
<h2>Federal laws</h2>
<p>That we have come to know so much more about what lead can do is thus an important part of the story unfolding in Flint. </p>
<p>As investigators of lead’s effects gained greater funding and independence and honed their methods, our understanding of its subtler and longer-term effects grew. </p>
<p>Research on children has shown behavioral disorders, learning difficulties and lowered IQ’s turning up at blood and environmental levels far below what was <a href="http://www.cdc.gov/nceh/lead/acclpp/final_document_030712.pdf">earlier thought safe</a>. Over the past 30 years, the CDC’s recommended blood levels for lead in the young have dropped precipitously, with no level now acknowledged as really safe. </p>
<figure class="align-center ">
<img alt="" src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/109091/original/image-20160124-441-qvm0lq.GIF?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&fit=clip" srcset="https://images.theconversation.com/files/109091/original/image-20160124-441-qvm0lq.GIF?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=600&h=409&fit=crop&dpr=1 600w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/109091/original/image-20160124-441-qvm0lq.GIF?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=600&h=409&fit=crop&dpr=2 1200w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/109091/original/image-20160124-441-qvm0lq.GIF?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=600&h=409&fit=crop&dpr=3 1800w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/109091/original/image-20160124-441-qvm0lq.GIF?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&h=514&fit=crop&dpr=1 754w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/109091/original/image-20160124-441-qvm0lq.GIF?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=754&h=514&fit=crop&dpr=2 1508w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/109091/original/image-20160124-441-qvm0lq.GIF?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=754&h=514&fit=crop&dpr=3 2262w" sizes="(min-width: 1466px) 754px, (max-width: 599px) 100vw, (min-width: 600px) 600px, 237px">
<figcaption>
<span class="caption">How standards for lead in water and blood got tighter as we learned more.</span>
<span class="attribution"><span class="source">Chris Sellers</span></span>
</figcaption>
</figure>
<p>With greater knowledge of lead’s damaging effects, a concerted campaign against lead started in the 1970s. A ban on its usage in paint in 1978 and a phase-out from gasoline into the 1980s have had considerable impacts.</p>
<p>A 1974 law to control lead in drinking water had less success, however, because it focused on what got pumped into pipes rather than what showed up in people’s faucets. </p>
<p>After an EPA study in 1986 showed <a href="http://pqasb.pqarchiver.com/washingtonpost_historical/doc/139024928.html?FMT=ABS&FMTS=ABS:AI&type=historic&date=Nov+6%2C+1986&author=By+Michael+Weisskopf+Washington+Post+Staff+Writer&pub=The+Washington+Post+%281974-Current+file%29&edition=&startpage=&desc=Dangerous+Amounts+of+Lead+in+Much+Drinking+Water%2C+EPA+Says">one in five of the nation’s drinking water systems</a> carried more lead than considered safe, Congress passed a new Clean Water Drinking Act the same year. This law is still the basis for our current efforts to control the lead that can leach from our water pipes.</p>
<p>Michigan Republican politicians, including Governor Rick Synder, have borne much blame for the Flint crisis – and <a href="https://www.rawstory.com/2016/01/gop-lead-poisoning-truthers-say-flint-water-crisis-vastly-overstated-and-might-even-be-a-hoax/">some of them continue to invite more</a>. But their party was instrumental in the genesis of this act.</p>
<p>It was <a href="http://www.epa.gov/aboutepa/president-signs-safe-drinking-water-act-amendments">Ronald Reagan who signed the bill</a> that finally banned the use of leaded pipe and high-lead soldering. And it was George H. W. Bush’s EPA that implemented it, through a 1991 Lead and Copper Rule that required “high-risk residences” to be monitored, with further measures if 10 percent of households exceeded <a href="http://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC2831942/">unsafe lead levels</a> of 15 parts per billion (ppb) in their tap water. </p>
<h2>Dropping anti-leaching agents</h2>
<p>The Clean Water Drinking Act, along with environmental and health officials, did encourage gradual replacement of lead pipes with nontoxic materials such as PVC. But municipalities mainly turned to a chemical fix to lower lead levels, namely anti-leaching agents. Cheaper and faster-acting, these substances could largely prevent lead from entering the water from pipes, soldering and when the source of drinking water changed. </p>
<p>The lead poisoning in Flint recalls a similar water emergency from the early 2000s in Washington, D.C. that highlights the risks of relying on anti-leaching chemicals.</p>
<p>That crisis began in 2001 when the District of Columbia Water and Sewer Authority (WASA) rather suddenly discovered lead levels in its testing that exceeded EPA’s action level. </p>
<figure class="align-center zoomable">
<a href="https://images.theconversation.com/files/109072/original/image-20160123-447-198sdgz.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=1000&fit=clip"><img alt="" src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/109072/original/image-20160123-447-198sdgz.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&fit=clip" srcset="https://images.theconversation.com/files/109072/original/image-20160123-447-198sdgz.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=600&h=450&fit=crop&dpr=1 600w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/109072/original/image-20160123-447-198sdgz.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=600&h=450&fit=crop&dpr=2 1200w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/109072/original/image-20160123-447-198sdgz.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=600&h=450&fit=crop&dpr=3 1800w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/109072/original/image-20160123-447-198sdgz.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&h=566&fit=crop&dpr=1 754w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/109072/original/image-20160123-447-198sdgz.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=754&h=566&fit=crop&dpr=2 1508w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/109072/original/image-20160123-447-198sdgz.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=754&h=566&fit=crop&dpr=3 2262w" sizes="(min-width: 1466px) 754px, (max-width: 599px) 100vw, (min-width: 600px) 600px, 237px"></a>
<figcaption>
<span class="caption">The Clean Water Drinking Act of 1986 led to replacement of lead water pipes with copper and PVCs.</span>
<span class="attribution"><a class="source" href="https://pixabay.com/en/water-pipe-wall-pipe-brick-518030/">Pixabay</a></span>
</figcaption>
</figure>
<p>Events moved even more slowly than in Flint, <a href="http://pqasb.pqarchiver.com/washingtonpost/doc/409548147.html?FMT=ABS&FMTS=ABS:FT&type=current&date=Jan%2031,%202004&author=David%20Nakamura&pub=The%20Washington%20Post&edition=&startpage=A.01&desc=Water%20in%20D.C.%20Exceeds%20EPA%20Lead%20Limit;%20Random%20Tests%20Last%20Summer%20Found%20High%20Levels%20in%204,000%20Homes%20Throughout%20City">hitting the headlines only in 2004</a>. Yet the dynamic was similar: <a href="http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/articles/A7094-2004Oct4.html">those in charge sought to downplay or even suppress what the water testing showed</a>. </p>
<p>The fact was, however, that by 2003 the dimensions of the crisis had become unmistakable. Nearly two-thirds of the water sampled (in “high-risk” homes) <a href="http://www.washingtoncitypaper.com/articles/28168/troubled-water">exceeded the action level</a> – this in a water system of a half million customers, far bigger than Flint’s. </p>
<p>As with Flint, reports from some homes ranged much higher, upwards of thousands of parts of lead per billion, surpassing levels in wastes deemed officially <a href="http://www.prism-magazine.org/nov04/feature_water.cfm">“hazardous</a>.”</p>
<p>In Washington, D.C., as in Flint, excess lead in faucets owed much to a <a href="http://niemanreports.org/articles/investigating-washington-d-c-s-water-quality/">decision to abandon anti-leaching agents</a>, in this case by the Army Corps of Engineers, whose aqueduct furnished the water for WASA. Cost was part of their rationale, but apparently less so than in Flint; they and the EPA officials who vetted their decision were more worried about high levels of bacteria. What then drew out the lead from existing pipes was a new set of disinfectants also applied by the Army Corps, <a href="http://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC1868000/">called chloramines</a>, which had a powerful leaching effect on the lead in the system’s old pipes and joints. </p>
<h2>Spotty monitoring</h2>
<p>There’s been one big difference between D.C.’s leaded water crisis and that of Flint: the speed and certainty with which the effects have been documented in the blood of water drinkers. </p>
<p>In Washington, an early CDC study failed to find any link between leaded water and blood leads. It was only after the crisis was over that a congressional investigation <a href="http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/content/article/2010/05/19/AR2010051902599.html">found the agency to have withheld some critical results.</a> A further study connected D.C.’s water crisis to <a href="http://pubs.acs.org/doi/abs/10.1021/es4034952">higher rates of miscarriages and fetal deaths</a>.</p>
<p>In Flint, by contrast, a <a href="http://ajph.aphapublications.org/doi/pdfplus/10.2105/AJPH.2015.303003">peer-reviewed study published just last year in the American Journal of Public Health</a> has demonstrated a clear and unequivocal connection between lead levels in the water and those in people’s blood. </p>
<figure class="align-right zoomable">
<a href="https://images.theconversation.com/files/109073/original/image-20160123-417-xf8qtu.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=1000&fit=clip"><img alt="" src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/109073/original/image-20160123-417-xf8qtu.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=237&fit=clip" srcset="https://images.theconversation.com/files/109073/original/image-20160123-417-xf8qtu.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=600&h=900&fit=crop&dpr=1 600w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/109073/original/image-20160123-417-xf8qtu.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=600&h=900&fit=crop&dpr=2 1200w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/109073/original/image-20160123-417-xf8qtu.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=600&h=900&fit=crop&dpr=3 1800w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/109073/original/image-20160123-417-xf8qtu.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&h=1131&fit=crop&dpr=1 754w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/109073/original/image-20160123-417-xf8qtu.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=754&h=1131&fit=crop&dpr=2 1508w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/109073/original/image-20160123-417-xf8qtu.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=754&h=1131&fit=crop&dpr=3 2262w" sizes="(min-width: 1466px) 754px, (max-width: 599px) 100vw, (min-width: 600px) 600px, 237px"></a>
<figcaption>
<span class="caption">Because understanding of the hazards of lead was slow, lead pipes are commonplace around the U.S.</span>
<span class="attribution"><a class="source" href="https://www.flickr.com/photos/intangible/2697774899/in/photolist-57oNuk-57sYgy-3bpdKT-57oMBX-63uLfy-63uLfu-6HRAzU-6YCPDa-681cNQ-ogwZUy-9GPKhV-4Sgmod-9sgLrt-6WUPtP-9JDfNg-6KSKUi-db4bVQ-51xAWG-dBA2Qx-7fcjbV-aVhCy-wFmuub-5DuStk-rNQ2P-391CEg-C9i3F-9ND4C8-q3Aeut-q3nUJf-zJP5Rq-ztpMg8-7fhfxJ-bekZgM-72thyu-4kPwM4-7KshfQ-nfEEEY-zpFZB-8p3Gwg-c6xNFN-diHooY-aFuLNa-7zcaUj-diHqLr-75CS2v-diLmYX-diLmD2-4ZUXzw-di6HC3-di6JNi">intangible/flickr</a>, <a class="license" href="http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/4.0/">CC BY</a></span>
</figcaption>
</figure>
<p>What both these experiences make clear is just how risky it has become to rely on monitoring that remains spotty and on chemical treatments, which can be easily abandoned. </p>
<p>We’d now do well to consider the ultimate cause of this type of lead poisoning: the built-in legacy of America’s last leaded century, those old, ever-dangerous conduits by which so many of us still get our drinking water. </p>
<p>Currently, their replacement happens only sporadically, in the wake of crises, if then. </p>
<p>From 2003, the Washington, D.C. government has spent millions digging out and <a href="http://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC1868000/">replacing its toxic piping</a>. The mayor of Flint has called for a <a href="http://www.npr.org/sections/thetwo-way/2016/01/21/463861880/flint-mayor-politics-and-profit-perpetuated-lead-tainted-water-crisis">similar project there</a>, yet so far, promises of support have failed to materialize.</p>
<p>An estimated three to six million miles of lead pipes across our country <a href="http://investigativereportingworkshop.org/investigations/toxic-taps/story/toxic-taps-lead-is-still-the-problem/">still carry water</a>, and most all of them are vulnerable to similar dangers, whether at the hands of short-sighted and prejudicial bureaucrats or politicians whose ideology or opportunism leads them to blithely dismiss well-established science. </p>
<p>The best solution would be to replace our lead lines systematically and proactively, not just one crisis-beset city at a time. Until we do so, it’s a safe bet that more Flints lie on our horizon.</p><img src="https://counter.theconversation.com/content/53473/count.gif" alt="The Conversation" width="1" height="1" />
<p class="fine-print"><em><span>Chris Sellers does not work for, consult, own shares in or receive funding from any company or organization that would benefit from this article, and has disclosed no relevant affiliations beyond their academic appointment.</span></em></p>A wake-up call from Flint: the U.S. has made great gains in reducing lead exposure, but the country is still saddled with millions of miles of water-carrying lead pipes.Chris Sellers, Professor of History, Stony Brook University (The State University of New York)Licensed as Creative Commons – attribution, no derivatives.tag:theconversation.com,2011:article/535532016-01-22T11:03:45Z2016-01-22T11:03:45ZFlint’s water crisis is a blatant example of environmental injustice<figure><img src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/108915/original/image-20160121-9766-16apbg6.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=496&fit=clip" /><figcaption><span class="caption">Tap water in Flint's hospital on October 16</span> <span class="attribution"><a class="source" href="http://flintwaterstudy.org/2015/10/flint-trip-3/">Joyca Zhu/Flint Water Study</a></span></figcaption></figure><p><em>Many observers see race and class as factors in Flint, Michigan’s drinking water crisis. Earlier this week Flint’s mayor, Karen Weaver, said, “It’s a minority community. It’s a poor community. And our voices were not heard.” We asked Robert D. Bullard, Dean of the School of Public Affairs at Texas Southern University and a pioneering scholar in the field of environmental justice, to discuss how race and class have shaped the ongoing public health disaster in Flint.</em></p>
<p><strong>How do you think regulatory agencies would have handled Flint’s drinking water problems if they were dealing with a middle-class, majority-white community?</strong></p>
<p>State regulators and the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) regional office in Chicago would have acted differently if this water crisis had taken place in a white suburb of Detroit. What happened in Flint is a blatant example of environmental injustice. The more information comes out, the clearer it is that this community was not treated according to the usual protocols. It was almost as if regulators didn’t believe them and thought their health wasn’t important. </p>
<p>In studying the history of environmental justice, you see over and over that it generally takes longer for poor communities to be heard when they make complaints. Government officials received complaints in April 2014 expressing that something was wrong with the water in Flint. If regulators at the Michigan Department of Environmental Quality had had to drink that water, or serve it to their children, their response would have been different.</p>
<p><strong>You’ve written about the role of race in government responses to disasters and public health crises. Do you see parallels between Flint’s situation and other cases?</strong></p>
<p>There’s a reason for the title of my book, <a href="http://nyupress.org/books/9780814799932/">“The Wrong Complexion for Protection: How the Government Response to Disaster Endangers African American Communities.”</a> We reviewed 80 years of disaster responses, from the 1927 Mississippi River flood to Hurricane Katrina in 2005 and the BP oil spill in 2010. What we found was that government is disproportionately slower to respond to disasters when communities of color are involved. </p>
<p>Unequal protection is a reality. The right to clean air, clean water and safe places for kids to play is something that affluent communities take for granted. But many low-income and minority communities don’t get parks, or street lights, or housing code enforcement, or safe drinking water. The cumulative environmental stresses in these neighborhoods create a toxic stew. And then government agencies don’t respond when people complain. The government’s nonresponse to Flint’s water crisis is on the scale of the federal nonresponse to Hurricane Katrina.</p>
<figure class="align-center ">
<img alt="" src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/108916/original/image-20160121-9725-1465fvx.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&fit=clip" srcset="https://images.theconversation.com/files/108916/original/image-20160121-9725-1465fvx.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=600&h=338&fit=crop&dpr=1 600w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/108916/original/image-20160121-9725-1465fvx.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=600&h=338&fit=crop&dpr=2 1200w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/108916/original/image-20160121-9725-1465fvx.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=600&h=338&fit=crop&dpr=3 1800w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/108916/original/image-20160121-9725-1465fvx.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&h=424&fit=crop&dpr=1 754w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/108916/original/image-20160121-9725-1465fvx.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=754&h=424&fit=crop&dpr=2 1508w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/108916/original/image-20160121-9725-1465fvx.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=754&h=424&fit=crop&dpr=3 2262w" sizes="(min-width: 1466px) 754px, (max-width: 599px) 100vw, (min-width: 600px) 600px, 237px">
<figcaption>
<span class="caption">Delivering bottled water to Flint residents.</span>
<span class="attribution"><a class="source" href="https://www.flickr.com/photos/michemhs/23715000534/">Michigan State Police/Flickr</a>, <a class="license" href="http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nd/4.0/">CC BY-ND</a></span>
</figcaption>
</figure>
<p><strong>Why do you think regulators may discount complaints from low-income and minority communities? Do they think those residents don’t vote, or are uninformed about the issues they are complaining about?</strong></p>
<p>We still have biases toward poor people in our society. When residents say that brown water is coming out of their taps, there’s an attitude that it’s not a big deal and they should tolerate it. That attitude turns poor and minority communities into environmental sacrifice zones, where polluting facilities are clustered, because the view is that they already have factories or incinerators there and residents are used to it, so why not add a few more?</p>
<p>If you try to put industrial facilities in affluent neighborhoods, residents mobilize with lawyers and scientists, and they tell elected officials that those installations are “not a fit” for their neighborhoods. On the other hand, Flint is in receivership, so you have people running the city who are caretakers and don’t know a lot about it or have a personal connection to it. </p>
<p><strong>One of your early books, <a href="https://westviewpress.com/books/dumping-in-dixie/">“Dumping in Dixie,”</a> described environmental racism in southern states. Do you think the problem is equally urgent in other regions of the United States, such as the Midwest, or does it vary?</strong></p>
<p>Environmental injustice is not unique to the South. For example, <a href="http://www.snre.umich.edu/profile/dorceta_e_taylor_phd">Dorceta Taylor</a> and <a href="http://www.snre.umich.edu/profile/paul_mohai_phd">Paul Mohai</a> at the University of Michigan have shown that African Americans and Latinos in Detroit are disproportionately impacted by polluting industries and hazards. What’s happening in Flint is just a continuation of that pattern. </p>
<p><strong>Are there opportunities for progress in Flint’s water crisis?</strong></p>
<p>We need to look at the interactions between communities and state regulatory agencies, and between state regulators and federal regulators. The EPA has 10 regional offices across the United States, and often those offices’ relationships with state agencies exclude threatened communities from discussions. The key question is how to provide equal protection to disenfranchised communities and make sure their voices are heard. </p>
<p>The EPA has <a href="https://www.federalregister.gov/articles/2015/12/14/2015-31050/nondiscrimination-in-programs-or-activities-receiving-federal-assistance-from-the-environmental">proposed revisions</a> to its regulations implementing Title VI of the Civil Rights Act of 1964 and other laws that prohibit discrimination in programs or activities that receive federal funding. </p>
<p>Last week at an EPA listening session in Houston, I <a href="http://drrobertbullard.com/2016/01/13/comments-by-robert-d-bullard-at-epa-title-vi-civil-rights-listening-session-houston-january-12-2016/">urged the agency</a> to strengthen its standards and police environmental discrimination more aggressively. We have one set of laws and regulations, and they should be enforced equally across the board. </p>
<p>Flint residents deserve the same level of protection as any other Americans.</p><img src="https://counter.theconversation.com/content/53553/count.gif" alt="The Conversation" width="1" height="1" />
<p class="fine-print"><em><span>Robert D. Bullard has received funding from the National Institute of Environmental Health Sciences, the U.S. Department of Labor, and the Turner, Surdna, Nathan Cummings, Ford, W.K. Kellogg and Robert Wood Johnson Foundations. He is a member of the Environmental Defense Fund's Texas advisory board and a lifelong member of the Sierra Club.</span></em></p>If Flint, Michigan were an affluent suburb, would residents have been exposed as long to drinking toxic water? Pioneering scholar Robert Bullard calls Flint’s crisis a classic case of environmental discriminationRobert D. Bullard, Dean, School of Public Affairs, Texas Southern UniversityLicensed as Creative Commons – attribution, no derivatives.