This is just as experts have blamed illegal miners for the scourge in the state.
The Director-General of NEMA, Muhammad Sani-Sidi, made the disclosure in his keynote address at the national workshop on the mitigation of the risk of lead poisoning associated with gold mining and processing among rural communities in Zamfara State.
Sani-Sidi said as a result of a reported increase in infant mortality in the state, which was suspected to be associated with lead poisoning due to mining activities among rural communities, local and international responders rendered short-term interventions and make necessary Environmental Impact Assessment (EIA), which confirmed the number of casualties.
He added that “the immature body system of children exposed to contaminated soils and gold processing tools tends to rapidly absorb associated lead and, in the process, poisoning then leading to convulsion, paralysis and even death.”
Sani-Sidi, therefore, called for an effective environmental management, land use planning and strict compliance to occupational safety and industrial regulations, as the society exploited its natural resources to sustain livelihood.
Meanwhile, also onat the occasion, experts and stakeholders accused gold miners and processors for being responsible for lead poisoning in some northern states, alleging that they used materials and chemical that were banned, while wastes generated from the processing of gold were not property disposed off.
These observations were made in Gusau, Zamfara State, at a workshop organised for stakeholders by the NEMA, to find lasting solutions to the problem of lead poisoning ravaging some states in Nigeria.
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