DURHAM, N.C. – A 91-led community partnership that is helping reduce the risk of lead poisoning among children in North Carolina will receive a 2008 National Achievement in Environmental Justice Award from the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency.

Marie Lynn Miranda, director of the Children’s Environmental Health Initiative (CEHI) and associate professor of environmental sciences and policy at the Nicholas School of the Environment at 91, will accept the award on behalf of the partnership in a ceremony October 21 in Atlanta.

The award cites CEHI for its work since 2002 to promote early intervention strategies to prevent lead poisoning, particularly its efforts to develop and distribute a new mapping tool that public health agencies and community advocates can use to identify households where children are most at risk.

The tool, called the Childhood Lead Exposure Risk Model, uses advanced spatial and statistical analysis of data from county tax records, the U.S. Census, and blood lead screening tests to create secure, Web-based maps that predict lead exposure risk levels on a house-by-house scale. It allows local health departments to enter new data, search maps, and create reports according to specific local criteria. Health officials can even cross-reference high-risk housing with lists of Medicaid and WIC recipients, enabling them to comply with state lead testing mandates and protect these especially vulnerable children.

The model, which is available through the CEHI Web site at , is now available for use in 43 North Carolina counties and about a dozen other sites nationwide, including Detroit, Mich., and Kenosha County, Wis.

In Durham County, where it has been used since 2002, it has led to a 600 percent increase in the early identification of homes with children with elevated blood-lead levels.

“Lead poisoning remains the foremost environmental health threat to children in the United States,” says Miranda, associate professor of environmental science and policy at Duke’s Nicholas School of the Environment.  “It affects children of all races and socioeconomic levels; however, low-income and minority children are at particular risk.

“The model we’ve developed gives public health officials information they can use to prioritize their limited resources, identify the homes with the highest exposure risks, and intervene before children become sick,” she says.

The EPA award also recognizes Miranda and her team for their ongoing public education and outreach, most recently the countywide Lead Summit and Durham Environmental Lead Collaborative (DELC), which CEHI spearheaded in 2007 after water samples with high lead levels from a number of Durham homes raised concerns about the safety of the city’s drinking water.

In addition to water, other potential sources of lead exposure are deteriorating lead-based paint in dust and soil; lead-containing vinyl mini-blinds; traditional medicines or cosmetics; imported food; batteries and hobby materials; and some ceramics and pottery.
Miranda and her team have published studies on lead exposure in numerous peer-reviewed journals, including three articles since 2002 in Environmental Health Perspectives, the nation’s leading environmental health journal.  

The CEHI team will be joined at the award ceremony in Atlanta by representatives of many of its partners, including the North Carolina Childhood Lead Poisoning Prevention Program; the Durham Affordable Housing Coalition; the Durham People's Alliance; the Durham Department of Water Management; the Durham Department of Neighborhood Improvement Services; the Partnership Effort for the Advancement of Children’s Health; and the Durham County Health Department.

“We share this honor with each of them, because this truly has been a community-wide effort,” Miranda says.