§ Sir Bernard Braineasked the Secretary of State for Social Services if he will arrange for his Department to study the recent findings of Professor Herbert Needleman of the Harvard medical school into the effects on children of exposure to lead in the atmosphere and publish the conclusions reached.
§ Sir George YoungThe main findings of Professor H. L. Needleman were discussed in paragraphs 152–159 of the report of the Department's working party on lead—"Lead and Health": HMSO March 1980. A copy of this report is in the Library of the House. A more recent paper by Professor Needleman and colleagues reports the patterns of electrical activity in the brain in some of the children from the main study and a relationship with lead levels is claimed. This further information along with other recent evidence is being taken into account by the Government in considering their response to the working party's report.