Lead paint dangers are clear. If you own a home that was built before lead paint was outlawed for residential use, you and your family are at risk. Particularly if the paint is peeling or chipping.

This is not a sky is falling story. This is real. Many children, especially children in our nation's poorest communities, have demonstrated higher lead levels in their blood. In short, lead problems are real, and lead-related disabilities can affect your children if you do not take necessary preventive measures.

Rhode Island has just come forward with its own necessary measures. Taking a lesson from the government's lawsuit against the hugely powerful and rich tobacco industry, Rhode Island has sued several companies that once made or sold lead-based paint. The apparent theory is that these companies knowingly placed dangerous products in the market place, knowing that consumers might become sick.

I learned long ago that if you do not want someone else, or everyone else, to know something, do not put that something in writing. The tobacco industry learned this in the suit that resulted in last year's settlement. Apparently, some crippling old documents indicated that the tobacco industry was aware of the health risks for many years before the public became aware. Other documents apparently suggested that cigarette companies played with nicotine levels in order to increase addiction.

Individually, tobacco plaintiffs usually lost in suits against tobacco companies. Whenever Tobacco was sued, the tobacco companies hired the biggest, the best and the most expensive lawyers to defend them in the most aggressive manner possible. The usually sick plaintiffs, on the other hand, often had one or a couple of lawyers, with relatively limited resources either in terms of money or man-power. The match always seemed to be one-sided.

That was until the Attorneys General of the various states pooled their resources and filed a giant lawsuit against Tobacco. This became Goliath against Goliath, which yielded a $206 Billion settlement. Billion, with a "B".

Now, Rhode island has started the process in its suit against the lead-paint companies. We will have to see what the evidence is against these companies. Rhode Island claims that, once again, there are documents which show that the lead paint industry knew about the health hazards going back to the turn of the century. Apparently, one company even promoted lead paint as a healthy alternative while this information was internally available.

I anticipate that other States and Cities will join Rhode Island. I would imagine that every State with a lead paint problem, which is probably every State, will see this as another cost effective means of dealing with this issue.

The question may ultimately be the same one asked during the Watergate hearings. What did the lead paint industry know, and when did the lead paint industry know it? If they knew this stuff could make our kids sick for years before the public was told, the industry might want to place its hand tightly on its wallet. Time will tell what it knew and when it knew it.

On a final point, if you have access to the internet quality lead poisoning information is available on a new website sponsored by the New Jersey Poison Information and Education System. The site address is http://www.njpipes.org

The site was launched in early October and is interactive. Children and adults may use it and learn from it. They will also enjoy it. If you have the right software, your computer will actually shake at certain locations. I highly recommend this useful website.

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Published: October 28, 1999

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Stuart Lieberman, Esq. writes about environmental issues. He was a New Jersey Deputy Attorney General assigned to the State Department of Environmental Protection from 1986 to 1990. Currently he is a shareholder in the environmental law firm of Lieberman & Blecher, P.C., located in Princeton, New Jersey. Stuart can be reached at slieberman@liebermanblecher.com.