Lead is absorbed quickly by children and can cause developmental delays and behavior problems. Lead was banned from U.S. house paint in 1978 — but children may eat spices and herbal remedies every day, and there is no national limit on lead in spices.
Childhood lead cases have been falling in North Carolina, but one county saw children with confirmed blood lead levels of 5 μg/dL or more (CDC's reference value) rise from 27 in 2013 to 44 in 2017. Many lived in new housing — yet spices, remedies and ceremonial powders from their homes held high levels of lead.
The study
The North Carolina Childhood Lead Poisoning Prevention Program (NCCLPPP) reviewed home lead investigations from January 2011 to January 2018 — 983 properties in all — and found 59 (6.0%) where spices, herbal remedies or ceremonial powders had been sampled, investigated because of elevated blood lead in 61 children.
| The children | |
|---|---|
| Average blood lead | 17.0 μg/dL at screening; 15.2 at diagnosis |
| Average age at investigation | 2.3 years (0.9–6.6) |
| Race (known for 58) | 41 Asian (including children of Indian and Pakistani descent), 9 Black (including two siblings born in West Africa), 8 white (one from Afghanistan) |
| Hispanic (known for 51) | 7 |
Screening and diagnostic blood lead levels in the 61 children. CDC
The homes were in eight mostly urban counties, and 42 (71%) were built after 1978. Of those newer homes, 32 showed no sign of lead in paint, dust, blinds, faucets, tub glaze or furniture finish, and in seven of them, spices, remedies and ceremonial powders were the only risk found.
What was in the samples
Of 386 samples analyzed — 344 foods (spices and herbal remedies) and 42 non-foods (mostly ceremonial powders) — 111 (28.8%) contained at least 1 mg/kg of lead: 76 food items and 35 non-food items (83.3% of the non-foods).
| Highest average lead | mg/kg |
|---|---|
| Surma (non-food; one sample) | 68,000 |
| Sindoor (non-food) | 41,401 (range 0.1–130,000) |
| Kumkum (non-food) | 12,185 (range 0.4–140,000) |
| Saffron supplement (food; one sample) | 2,764 |
| Balguti Kesaria, an Ayurvedic medicine (one sample) | 220 |
| Turmeric | 66 (range 0.1–740) |
Where it was known, 76% of the samples had been bought in the United States — but origin was recorded for fewer than half.
How lead gets in
Spices can pick up lead at many points in the global supply chain: they're often grown where leaded gasoline, smelters, battery plants and mines have polluted soil and water; fertilizers and grinding machinery add more; and some are deliberately adulterated to boost color or weight. More than 95% of spices used in the U.S. are imported, so "buy local" isn't practical.
Limits for comparison:
| Lead limit | |
|---|---|
| Infant formula (WHO Codex standard) | 0.02 mg/kg |
| Salt (WHO Codex) | 2 mg/kg |
| FDA: natural food color additives such as paprika, saffron, turmeric | 10 mg/kg |
| FDA action level: candy for children | 0.1 mg/kg |
| FDA action level: other food for children | 0.5 mg/kg |
| Spices | none — they aren't treated as food meant for children |
National surveys suggest most Americans eat little of these spices (about 0.03 g of turmeric a day), but families from Southeast Asia may use far more in daily cooking, home remedies and ceremonies. U.S. spice imports have risen about 50% since 1998, and online sales, travel and gifts from relatives make regulation harder. Investigators found these products used by both recent immigrants and U.S.-born children, and ceremonial powders, though not food, can be swallowed by children by accident.
What's being done
- NCCLPPP built a survey tool — tested with Hispanic and South Asian community focus groups, in English and Spanish — to record how much children consume and where products come from, for reporting to the FDA.
- It added a workflow to flag new cases linked to consumable products; for U.S.-bought items, its epidemiologist alerts the FDA's regional consumer safety liaison. It also leads a national workgroup on standard reporting protocols. New York City, New York State and California have their own recall and alert systems, and in 2017 the FDA formed a Toxic Elements Working Group.
Recommendations:
- Educate parents — with materials in several languages at festivals, places of worship and community centers.
- Keep ceremonial powders out of children's reach.
- Test children who regularly consume spices or herbal remedies.
- Investigators should sample these products and document origin and use.
- More testing at ports of entry, and a national maximum limit for lead in spices and herbal remedies.
See CDC's advice on lead in folk medicine.
Limits
Spices are often bought in bulk and repackaged, losing origin and lot information; many investigators didn't sample these products; until recently, children with levels of 5–9 μg/dL usually weren't offered home investigations; and missing consumption data, a small sample and wide age range rule out modeling the exposures.
Sources
Based on Angelon-Gaetz KA, Klaus C, Chaudhry EA, Bean DK, "Lead in Spices, Herbal Remedies, and Ceremonial Powders Sampled from Home Investigations for Children with Elevated Blood Lead Levels — North Carolina, 2011–2018," MMWR volume 67, number 46, Centers for Disease Control and Prevention; a work of the United States government in the public domain. The report's percentages for the children's race and ethnicity don't match the denominators it gives, so only counts are shown.
许可协议： CC0 1.0（公有领域） · 改编自 www.cdc.gov
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