March 23, 2023: Umicore revealed on March 23 results from Belgium’s Provincial Institute for Hygiene (PIH), following an additional lead-in-blood test the institute conducted among 291 toddlers in the wider vicinity of the battery materials group’s Hoboken site in Antwerp.
These toddlers live further away than the children from the adjacent Moretusburg and Hertogvelden neighbourhoods whose blood the PIH tests every six months.
The average measured lead-in-blood value in the pre-schoolers is 1.74 micrograms per decilitre (µg/dl) and is below the average of 2.36 µg/dl in the pres-choolers who participated in the semi-annual lead-in-blood measurement last autumn.
Umicore said the results confirm the findings of the semi-annual, voluntary measurements of children aged one to 12 in Moretusburg and Hertogvelden, which each time show that average lead-in-blood levels are lower as children live farther from the site.
The firm said the results also underscore the importance of a green zone it will establish in 2024 to create distance between the site and the adjacent neighbourhood.