Lead poisoning, all but eradicated in the West, still harms millions of children in the developing world, with lead-acid battery recycling a key culprit.
Car batteries contain about $15 worth of lead, a significant sum in the Global South. Informal salvage businesses buy old batteries and melt the lead in makeshift furnaces, releasing waste that ends up in the air, soil, and water.
An estimated one in three children worldwide — 800 million — have blood lead levels as high as those in Flint, Michigan’s 2014 water crisis. Lead is a neurotoxin that impairs brain development. Fixing the problem should be simple, Vox reported: Removing taxes on licensed, safer recyclers, allowing them to compete with unlicensed ones, would be a start.
