CNN: Lead-laden lunchboxes OK'd by government

February 18, 2007

A researcher with the Center for Environmental Health, displays a swab with pink coloring indicating lead contamination on a lunchbox in Oakland, California, in January.

(AP) -- In 2005, when government scientists tested 60 soft, vinyl lunchboxes, they found that one in five contained amounts of lead that medical experts consider unsafe -- and several had more than 10 times hazardous levels.

But that's not what they told the public.

Instead, the Consumer Product Safety Commission released a statement that they found "no instances of hazardous levels." And they refused to release their actual test results, citing regulations that protect manufacturers from having their information released to the public.

That data was not made public until The Associated Press received a box of about 1,500 pages of lab reports, in-house e-mails and other records in response to a Freedom of Information Act request filed a year ago....

"They found levels that we consider very high," said Alexa Engelman, a researcher at the Oakland, California-based Center for Environmental Health, which has filed a series of legal complaints about lead in lunchboxes.

"They knew this all along and they didn't take action on it. It's upsetting to me. Why are we, as a country, protecting the companies? We should be protecting the kids. I don't think in this instance they did their job."...

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