Karen Davis recently moved to a new property in Port Pirie further away from Nyrstar's lead smelter in a desperate bid to reduce the blood lead levels of her four-year-old son Macen, as data shows the problem is not improving for children in the region.
Macen's latest blood lead level (BLL) results show that while his levels have decreased, they remain far above the national average, as for most children in the town.
"I get judged in this town because Mason's lead level was high, so it obviously [was a conclusion drawn by] other people that I had a feral house," Ms Davis said.
"I cried, I cried because of the fact that 'what am I doing wrong as a parent?'"
The 2022 state report for BLL in children under five years of age showed that nearly 65 per cent were living with levels above the national standard for requiring investigation.
Dr Chris Lease is responsible for monitoring BLL for SA Health and said the while levels remained high, results indicated that the problem had levelled out on previous years.
"Whilst we haven't seen any further improvements in the overall results it does look like a possibility that the results in blood lead trends are starting to stabilise," Dr Lease said.
"[But] we did see an increase in the number of children above 10 and 20 micrograms of lead per decilitre (μg/dL) in under-5-year-olds."
Twenty μg/dL is four times the National Health and Medical Research Council's lead exposure investigation level, while the World Health Organization states that no level is safe.
"Lead is a neurotoxin so of course it is of concern, and at this level we're seeing the risks of some of those health affects manifesting themselves," Dr Lease said.
"We can see neurological impacts, we can see things like increased blood pressure, low haemoglobin, problems with the kidneys.
"There might be a need for other interventions such as … directly [taking] the lead out of the blood but that's quite an extreme intervention. We really want to be able to try and manage those numbers down by a range of things."
Smelter reaffirms lead reduction commitments
A spokesperson for Nyrstar said the company was working through its Targeted Lead Abatement Program (TLAP) with the state government on programs to reduce BLL in Port Pirie children.
"At our site, important projects have delivered reduced lead-in-air concentrations in the community over recent years," they said.
"This year we are progressing construction of our Product Recycling Facility and a range of other projects to continue to see further reductions."
Ms Davis said she wanted more involvement from bodies with no affiliation with Nyrstar to take responsibility for remediation, observation, and treatment for families in Port Pirie.
"There needs to be some accountability and there needs to be an outsider that doesn't have money invested or anything invested into Nyrstar to check out what's going on," she said.
