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Area students targeted for study connecting arsenic, IQ

By Matthew Stone mstone@centralmaine.com
Staff Writer

OAKLAND -- School districts in central Maine might have something to offer a group of researchers from Columbia University and the University of New Hampshire: study subjects.

The universities' researchers are interested in the connection between high levels of arsenic in ground water and the IQ of third-, fourth- and fifth-grade students.

They're targeting central Maine school systems because geological surveys show a number of communities in Kennebec County and surrounding areas have high arsenic content in their water supplies.

Much of Maine's topography, federal and state geologists have found, features types of rock that dissolve arsenic -- and other elements, including uranium, radon and manganese -- into ground water.

"If your water is high (in arsenic), you may not want to drink it," Carol Ladd, a Wayne resident and University of New Hampshire researcher, told about a dozen central Maine school superintendents gathered at the Messalonskee School District's central office on Tuesday. "You may not want to cook rice or spaghetti, things that absorb a lot of water."

The researchers three years ago started evaluating elementary-school children in Fayette and the Maranacook-area school district, which serves Manchester, Mount Vernon, Readfield and Wayne. Now, they want to expand their Maine sample size to 500 students whose families use private well water.

"It's been a very easy project to participate in," said Rich Abramson, the Maranacook superintendent.

Early indications from the study are that there's a "small differential" between the intelligence levels of those children with high arsenic levels in their families' private well-water supplies and those without it, Abramson said.

"After one year, it was pretty obvious to us," he said.

But the researchers need more Maine study subjects before they can draw concrete conclusions, Ladd told the superintendents.

The researchers so far have evaluated well-water supplies from more than 200 children and their families. They found that the water supplies of 55 of the first 92 study participants had arsenic levels that exceed federal guidelines.

As the Columbia and University of New Hampshire researchers recruit 500 Maine study participants, Ladd said, they're simultaneously undertaking a similar investigation in Bangladesh, which they began in 2000. They plan to compare study results.

Families that participate in the study -- they sign up through their children's schools in participating districts -- receive free well-water tests to determine the arsenic levels of their water supplies, and Ladd tests the children and their mothers to determine IQ. Researchers say the mother's IQ is one of the most accurate predictors of a child's IQ.

The research into the connection between arsenic levels in water and children's intelligence is drawing attention to the prevalence of arsenic in water, Ladd said.

"The community starts to realize, it is a problem in our area," she said.

And it's not a problem solved by simple water filtration, she said. The deeper wells are placed in the ground, according to Ladd, the less likely they are to be contaminated by arsenic.

Matthew Stone -- 623-3811, ext. 435

mstone@centralmaine.com