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Pennsylvania Comes Up Short On Funding For Lead Testing And Cleanup

Jacquelyn Martin
/
AP Photo

 

Before Flint, Michigan's water crisis brought lead back to the fore, many people thought lead poisoning was an issue of the past. But it still affects thousands of children each year in Pennsylvania alone, yet funding for lead testing and abatement has declined. 

Federal lead abatement programs have lost 43 percent of their funding since 2003,according to The New York Times.And the Centers for Disease Control has cut funding for blood testing by half since 2009.

With federal dollars quickly disappearing, it seems that major investment in lead — whether that's testing, treatment or abatement — will likely have to come from state coffers. And in that regard, Pennsylvania is not keeping up with the neighbors. 

Read the full version of this reportat Keystone Crossroads' websiteKeystone Crossroads is a new statewide public media initiative reporting on the challenges facing Pennsylvania's cities. WPSU is a participating station.

Eleanor Klibanoff was WPSU's reporter for Keystone Crossroads, a statewide reporting collaboration that covers the problems and solutions facing Pennsylvania's cities. Previously, Eleanor was a Kroc Fellow at NPR in DC. She worked on the global health blog and Weekend Edition, reported for the National desk and spent three months at member station KCUR in Kansas City. Before that, she covered abortion politics in Nicaragua and El Salvador, two of the seven countries in the world that completely ban the procedure. She's written for Atlanta Magazine, The Nicaragua Dispatch and Radio Free Europe.