A routine medical checkup for a Trenton toddler uncovered dangerous lead levels. A mother struggled to navigate home inspections and health risks—and then made a hard choice.
Amber DeLoney-Stewart brought her 2-year-old, Valencia, to the doctor’s office for an annual checkup in early September. Valencia was a happy girl with round cheeks, and the appointment was a routine physical exam, with vaccinations and some bloodwork. But the lab result proved to be anything but routine.
“Her iron is fine,” the doctor said about Valencia’s test results. “But it’s showing that she has lead.”
A second finger prick confirmed significant lead levels in Valencia’s blood, prompting more lab work and tests at a separate facility. Within days, DeLoney-Stewart learned the child had five micrograms per deciliter of lead in her blood: a number considered elevated by CDC standards.
Children in Trenton are increasingly at risk for lead contamination. A 2022 state study revealed that 6.1 percent of Trenton’s children younger than 6 years old had elevated lead in their blood, the highest rate in the state. Under state law, the local health department must step in and follow up on the child’s condition with additional tests and the home must be tested within three weeks with blood lead levels like Valencia’s. Sean Stratton, a public health researcher and Ph.D. student at Rutgers University who has focused on lead in the area for years, offered to provide a free high-level inspection when DeLoney-Stewart turned to Trenton Water Works for help. They connected through a local community leader, Shereyl Snider, who works regularly with Stratton.
Lead circulates through the human body like calcium and can affect nerve signaling, bone growth and brain development. But unlike calcium, which is stored and released as the body needs it, lead circulates through those systems and can leave some lasting and debilitating effects.
“One of the things that we think it does is it makes the brain a little leakier,” said Brian Buckley, a public health researcher at Rutgers University. “The brain is designed to take in the nutritional things it needs and exclude the bad things. It doesn’t do as good a job when there’s a high concentration of lead.”
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