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Bioavailability of lead-contaminated soils in a tropical environment: Jamaica

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Abstract

The impact of soil lead bioavailability on exposure assessments is well documented in developed countries. However, in tropical developing countries such as Jamaica, few studies address its importance. An assessment of lead bioavailability in Jamaican soils is necessary as, over the past 40 years, cases of lead poisoning have consistently occurred. Exposure studies have indicated that the main pathway to human uptake is soil ingestion, and hence, a determination of lead bioavailability in Jamaican soils can significantly improve community health risk assessments. Given this need, this study seeks to assess the lead bioavailability in soils from sites previously found to have high lead contamination. These sites are: Mona Commons and Kintyre, both in the Parish of St Andrew, and Fraser’s Content in Parish St Catherine. The chosen sites have different soil characteristics, are now densely populated and have a history of childhood lead poisoning. Investigations were conducted using the Relative Bioavailability Leaching Procedure, which is an in vitro technique assessed and approved by the United States Environmental Protection Agency for specific site assessments of lead contamination. Three runs were conducted using representative samples of particle size less than 250 µm from each site. The results indicated relative bioavailability of Fraser’s Content, Mona Commons and Kintyre of 60%, 58% and 45%, respectively. These results are within the range reported in other countries (USA, Australia) with similar sources of contamination. It was concluded that the methodology may be used to assess lead bioavailability in Jamaican soils.

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Acknowledgement

The authors wish to express gratitude to International Centre for Environmental and Nuclear Science (ICENS), the Departments of Chemistry Occupational Environmental Safety and Health and Department of Physics of University of the West Indies (UWI). Sincere thanks to the International Atomic Energy Agency (IAEA) for assistance with soil analysis. Thanks to Jamaica Environmental Health Foundation and the Graduate Research and Publication Funding for the financial assistance with fieldwork and collaborative efforts obtained during project implementation.

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Authors and Affiliations

  1. Department of Physics, UWI, Mona, Jamaica

    T. Ramikie & M. Voutchkov

  2. Department of Chemistry, UWI, 2 Plymouth Crescent, Mona, Jamaica

    V. Rattray

Authors
  1. T. Ramikie
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  2. V. Rattray
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  3. M. Voutchkov
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Contributions

Trevor Ramikie undertook the fieldwork data collection, experimental runs, chemical and statistical analysis. Dr V. Rattray undertook the chemical analysis by FAAS and critically reviewed the manuscript. Professor M. Voutchkov assisted the design of the QA/QC procedure and also critically reviewed the manuscript.

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Correspondence to T. Ramikie.

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The authors declared no conflict of interest.

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Editorial responsibility: Hari Pant.

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Ramikie, T., Rattray, V. & Voutchkov, M. Bioavailability of lead-contaminated soils in a tropical environment: Jamaica. Int. J. Environ. Sci. Technol. 17, 2017–2026 (2020). https://doi.org/10.1007/s13762-019-02596-w

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  • DOI: https://doi.org/10.1007/s13762-019-02596-w

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