University of California Press

• SOURCE: NY Review of Books
  3-21-13
  

  Helen Epstein: Review of Gerald Markowitz and David Rosner's "Lead Wars: The Politics of Science and the Fate of America’s Children"

  Helen Epstein is an independent consultant and writer specializing in public health in developing countries, and an adjunct assistant professor at the Columbia University School of International and Public Affairs.In December 1993, a slum landlord in Baltimore named Lawrence Polakoff rented an apartment to a twenty-one-year-old single mother and her three-year-old son, Max.1 A few days after they moved in, Max’s mother was invited to participate in a research study comparing how well different home renovation methods protected children from lead poisoning, which is still a major problem endangering the health of millions of American children, many of them poor.