House subcommittee finds elevated lead levels in D.C. children.

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The Washington Post (8/4, Leonnig) reports that congressional investigators have found that "more than twice" the previously reported number of D.C. children were "found to have high levels of lead in their blood," which throws "into doubt assurances by those officials that the lead in tap water did not seriously harm city children." The discovery was made by "a House subcommittee investigating the federal Centers for Disease Control and Prevention's performance and has raised congressional concern about whether the agency properly alerted District residents to a health risk from unprecedented levels of lead in the water." The Post says that "the subcommittee's investigators uncovered the higher figures by seeking the data directly from all D.C. labs that analyze local test results," despite some blood tests taken in 2003 that "were inexplicably missing from D.C. government files." The CDC and the D.C. Department of Health used partial data to publish "a paper reporting that they were not finding a significant increase in children with dangerous lead levels." Rep. Brad Miller (D-N.C.), chairman of the investigations and oversight subcommittee of the House Science and Technology Committee, "said the new findings raise questions about the CDC's performance."