Meetings and webinars
Explore the latest and upcoming events
Upcoming events
Toxic Lead and Children’s Health: Approaches to Blood Lead Testing
(8:00-9:30 AM – EST New York time, February 1, 2023)
Abstract:
Lead is ubiquitous and is a neurotoxicant with devastating effects on children. No level of exposure to lead is known to be without harmful effects (WHO, 2019). It leads to reduced intelligence quotient, attention span, increased antisocial behaviour and a range of health conditions later in life.
Blood Lead Level (BLL) testing is an important surveillance tool. It could be done as part of a household survey or routine monitoring to identify lead-exposed children or for periodic monitoring for exposure and risk assessment. However, if the BLL results are above 3.5 µg/dl, this must be validated using a venous blood test. Venous sampling is a more invasive technique but allows accurate quantification of body burden.
Dried blood sampling (DBS) using either capillary or venous blood and placing it in a filter paper has the advantage of stability and ease of storage and transportation. A more recent derivative of DBS has comparable results with venous blood testing. In all types of blood collection, cost and laboratory capacities for lead analysis must be considered.
The Georgia experience of integrating BLL in the MICS household survey provides a good example of approaching BLL testing at country level.
Presenters:
- Abheet Solomon - Senior Programme Manager, Health Section, Programme Group, UNICEF
- Desiree Raquel Narvaez – Environmental Health Specialist, Health Section, Programme Group, UNICEF
- Nino Dzotsenidze – Environmental Health Officer, UNICEF Georgia Country Office
- Giorgi Kalakashvili – Child Right’s Monitoring Specialist, UNICEF Georgia Country Office
- Tako Ugulava – Health and Nutrition Specialist, UNICEF Georgia Country Office
Save these dates for the upcoming webinars!
22 February - Using pregnancy histories – the experience of the DHS Program. Trevor Croft, Chief of Data Quality, DHS Program
8 March - Latest developments on collecting data on children's time use.Francesca Grum (UNSD), Iliana Vaca-Trigo (UNSD), Lauren Pandolfelli (UNICEF), Eva Quintana (UNICEF)
Forthcoming topics:
- New tool for anaemia testing
- Collecting data on slum households
- Degree of urbanization
- Vaccine hesitancy
- Validation of MICS Plus substitution methodology
For all webinars in this series, including recordings of previous webinars, please visit:
- Data Collection Webinar Series (UNICEF internal site)
- UNICEF MICS YouTube (available to the public)