Present a brief understanding of the Epidemiological studies that have been used to draw attention to the need for standards in regards to childhood safety with regard to lead exposure. Review and present the findings from several studies that show the need for continued lowering of acceptable lead levels for children. Present findings that show the need to provide an adequate margin of safety by identifying children with body burden below that at which the risk of developmental toxicity becomes unacceptable. To present the arguments that have prompted the state to lower the lead level burden children face and why it may be better to leave the standards alone.

Speaker, George G. Rhoads is a graduate of Haverford College, Haverford, Pennsylvania, and completed his Medical Degree at Harvard University. He later completed a Master in Public Health at the University of Hawaii. Dr. Rhoads has spent an illustrious career practicing medicine as a Board Certified Internist and has spent a vast amount of his career in the field of Preventive Medicine. Dr. Rhoads has been a member of the Honolulu Heart Study at the National Heart, Lung, and Blood Institute; Assistant Director, utilizing a role as an internist and epidemiologist in a large prospective study of coronary heart disease; administrated a 70-bed government hospital in Nigeria, Africa which served 100,000 people; worked as a Research Associate in a Demographic Cancer Study through the University of Hawaii School of Public Health; an Epidemiologist for the Japan-Hawaii Cancer Study; Associate Professor of Public Health (Epidemiology), University of Hawaii's Medical School, Department of Family Practice and Community Health; has chaired the Department of Public Health Science and been the Director of the General Preventive Medicine Residency at the University of Hawaii; Chief of the Epidemiology Branch of the Preventive Research Program, National Institute of Child Health and Human Development, National Institute of Health; Director of the Division of Environmental Epidemiology and Statistics of the Environmental and Occupational Health Sciences Institute, Piscataway, NJ; and, Director of the New Jersey Graduate Program in Public Health, a jointly sponsored program of UMDNJ and Rutgers University. Dr. Rhoads has also been the recipient of many honors and awards, has memberships in many professional organizations, has written, co-written, or contributed to many published journal articles and books, and has been either the Director, Co-Director, or Principle investigator for many grant initiatives. As it relates to today's presentation, a partial listing of Dr. Rhoads grant activity and publication contributions include: Studies for Assessment and Prevention of Lead Exposure in Inner City Children; Toxicity of Lead in Children; Physician Education for Childhood Lead Poisoning; Development and Testing of Lead Exposure Metrics and Cleaning methods; Treatment of Lead Exposed Children; a pilot study of take-home lead exposure in New Jersey; the relationship between dust lead concentration and partial size in household dust collected in New Jersey; Lead in house dust; hygiene and food related behaviors associated with blood lead levels of young children from lead-contaminated homes; effectiveness of home cleaning strategies in reducing potential dust and lead exposure; accuracy and reproducibility of blood lead testing in commercial labs; childhood lead screening practices among New Jersey physicians; and getting the lead out, just to name a few.