US water systems repeatedly top federal standard for lead

Associated Press

GALESBURG, ILL.

This railroad town promotes its ties to Abraham Lincoln, Ronald Reagan and the poet Carl Sandburg. But Galesburg’s long history also shows in a hidden way: Aging pipes have been leaking lead into the drinking water for decades.

Blood tests show cause for concern. One in 20 children under the age of 6 in Knox County had lead levels exceeding the state standard for public health intervention, a rate six times higher than the Illinois average, in 2014.

Galesburg offers just one example of how the problem of lead-tainted drinking water goes far beyond Flint, Mich., the former auto-manufacturing center where the issue exploded into a public health emergency when the city’s entire water system was declared unsafe.

An Associated Press analysis of Environmental Protection Agency data found that nearly 1,400 water systems serving 3.6 million Americans exceeded the federal lead standard at least once between Jan. 1, 2013, and Sept. 30, 2015. The affected systems are large and small, public and private, and include 278 systems that are owned and operated by schools and day care centers in 41 states.

Galesburg officials downplay the water’s potential contribution to lead poisoning, which can affect children’s mental development.

The AP reviewed 25 years of sampling data reported by 75,000 drinking water systems that are subject to a federal lead rule that took effect in 1991. Details of the EPA data were first reported by USA Today.