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Flint Water Crisis

Lead in Flint man's blood is 5 times what's toxic

Katrease Stafford
Detroit Free Press
The lead level in the blood of Aaron Stinson, 39, of Flint, Mich., tested five times higher than what is considered toxic for adults.

FLINT, Mich. — Aaron Stinson shook his head and wiped the sweat from his brow as he sat in a brown, oversized sofa chair in the living room of his aunt's home here.

Excessive sweating, fatigue and severe headaches are just a handful of inexplicable symptoms he has experienced over the past six months, seemingly out of nowhere.

And while he has seen several news reports of Flint residents experiencing similar ailments after drinking the city's contaminated water, Stinson initially brushed it off, thinking he was fine.

Yet Stinson, 39, said Genesee County Health Department officials told him a Feb. 4 test showed he has the highest lead-blood levels of any adult tested in the county so far. Stinson's results, reviewed by the Free Press, revealed that he has blood-lead levels of 27 micrograms per decileter of blood, five times the level considered toxic.

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Levels above 5 micrograms are considered toxic, according to the federal Centers for Disease Control and Prevention. The CDC recommends intervention for anyone with elevated blood levels above 5 micrograms to remove lead sources.

Since Oct. 1, 44 of the 3,674 adult blood-lead level tests in Flint showed results greater than or equal to 5 ug/dl, Michigan Department of Health and Human Services officials said in an e-mail Wednesday. The state confirmed that only one of those adults tested had a blood-lead level of 27, the highest recorded and one of four higher than 15.

"I consume a lot of water," Stinson said Tuesday. "That may be where my issue came in at, thinking that I'm living healthy and drinking something that I thought was pure for my body. ...

"It's hard to really express how I feel, because I'm still trying to wrap my brain around it," he said. "My body is tainted with lead."

Stinson said he drank the water for a time after the city, while under the control of a state-appointed emergency manager, switched its water source in April 2014 to the Flint River as a temporary cost-cutting move.

The state Department of Environmental Quality failed to require the addition of needed corrosion-control chemicals. As a result, corrosive water caused lead to leach from pipes, joints and fixtures, causing many citizens to receive water with unsafe lead levels.

"I was having the symptoms, thinking it was maybe something I ate," Stinson said. "Or maybe I've been working too much or moving around too much.

"I went down there (to the county health department), took the test on the 4th of February and got a call back on the 7th," he said. "And she said she was concerned about my blood-lead levels.

The lead-poisoning diagnosis stunned Stinson. He said he felt a mixture of confusion and sudden sickness, especially when the official told him that the average adult tested had a level of 1 or 2.

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Now he uses only filtered water and bottled water, except when he bathes, he said. But sometimes out of habit, he forgets and accidentally uses the contaminated water to brush his teeth.

"Everybody wakes up in the morning and washes their face, brush(es) their teeth and drink(s) a cup of water,"  he said. "It's something I grew up doing my whole life, and now I gotta freeze or hold and try not to forget to put my toothbrush under the water, and it's hard."

Aaron Stinson, 39, of Flint, Mich., talks Feb. 16, 2016, at his aunt's home in Flint after his blood lead-level test showed he had 27 ug/dl.

Holding two lead- and copper-level test results in his hand from January that showed water in his home was safe to drink, Stinson said he's frustrated.

"I received letters in the mail telling me my water meets the state qualifications as being safe enough to consume, but I can tell you there's not a state lawmaker in Lansing or anywhere else who would drink just a tiny cup of Flint water out of that tap right now," he said.

Stinson's also worried. He said much of the news coverage on the Flint crisis has focused on children and not the potential effect lead poisoning can have on adults. He no longer trusts any water system and even questions the water at the restaurants he frequents in and outside of Flint.

"I'm basically going to have to live with this until it takes its toll on my body. It's just a matter of time," he said. "All I can do is keep going forward and hopefully, I can stretch my life out as long as I can."

Adults exposed to lead poisoning can suffer from anemia, neurotrophy — weakness, numbness or pain because of nerve damage — brain swelling and even death, said Dr. Peter LeWitt, a Henry Ford Health System neurologist.

"There's nothing good about lead poisoning," Lewitt said.

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A wealth of research has been conducted on the effect lead poisoning can have on adults, specifically a potential link to Parkinson's disease, he said.

"In fact, that has been an area of research at Henry Ford for many years," LeWitt said. "The cause of Parkinson's is not known, but there seems to be an environmental link. ...There has been published data that indicated increased risk associated with high lead levels of exposure. ... It isn't a strong association, but one that is scientifically compelling."

Wayne State University researchers in Detroit are testing to determine whether there's an actual link between the two, he said.

Testing has shown that exposing rodents to lead damages the same nerve cells that are lost in individuals who suffer from Parkinson's. Adults exposed to lead poison have a twofold risk of being diagnosed with Parkinson's, but LeWitt said most individuals who suffer from the disease do not have lead poisoning.

While Dr. Eden Wells, the state’s chief medical executive, said she doesn't know specifics about Stinson's case, a blood-lead level as high as 27 would definitely "perk her ears."

"When you see that, you always want to make sure that individual is following up" by routinely seeing a physician, Wells said. "I'm so glad he has not been drinking unfiltered water, but if I were his primary care physician, I'd immediately contact him to see what else you're doing that might be exposing you to lead inadvertently."

If an individual still has a high lead level months after he or she has stopped drinking the contaminated water, other factors could be at play, she said. Occupation and other environmental factors could affect blood-lead test results.

Blood tests for lead reflect only recent or ongoing exposure, not past exposure, Wells said. Lead has a half-life of 20 to 30 days.

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"There are many, many sources of lead in our environment," she said.

But Stinson and his aunt, Claudia Perkins-Milton, are convinced that the contaminated water is the culprit.

"This is wrong," Perkins-Milton said. "This is inhumane. Why hasn't anything been torn out of the infrastructure? They are very much aware that we're all in this death spiral, that's what I call it. ...

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"I am worried. I helped raise him from the time he was a baby," she said. "I'm sick and tired of being sick and tired."

Stinson said he's not sure what his future holds, but he's hopeful his experience will be a cautionary tale for others.

"I just want people to be aware," Stinson said. "Be aware of what's in their bodies, to be aware of their children's bodies because a lot of things go unheard and unsaid. ...

"This isn't limited to Flint," he said. "This is a nationwide thing."

Follow Katrease Stafford on Twitter: @KatreaseS_freep

Blood lead level test results of Flint resident Aaron Stinson 39 show his blood measured at 27 ug/dl seen at his aunt's home in Flint on Tuesday December 16, 2016.
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