- LONDON (ANI) -- Biting of
fingernails by children should be taken seriously after a new research
has revealed that those who bite their nails could damage their intelligent
quotient (IQ).
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- Researchers in Russia say children who chew their nails
are at greater risk of lead poisoning. This, they say, is because lead
can gather under their nails simply by playing in dusty conditions, both
indoors and outdoors.
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- It was earlier found that exposure to lead might contribute
to developmental problems and affect nervous system in some children, reports
BBC.
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- Scientists at the Ural Regional Centre for Environmental
Epidemiology in Ekaterinburg believe that biting finger nails may explain
why some children also show high levels of the chemical.
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- They assessed children living in a number of cities in
the Urals and found that as many as two out of three children in some areas
had worryingly high levels of lead.
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- Levels varied depending on whether the children lived
in homes that overlooked busy roads or if they had a habit of eating soil,
snow or paint.
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- But they also found a link between high levels of lead
and children who regularly bit their nails and traced that more than 69
per cent of girls and 62 per cent of boys involved in the study bit their
nails or other objects like pencils.
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- All of the children involved in the study lived in highly
industrialised cities with high levels of lead.
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- Dr Erik Millstone, a senior lecturer at the University
of Sussex, said: "The government stopped collecting figures on blood
lead levels a number of years ago. However, I wouldn't be surprised if
something in the order of six per cent to 10 percent of children under
the age of six had blood lead levels at which there is evidence of adverse
effects."
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