Lead poisoning is one of the biggest environmental and humanitarian injustices facing the United States, and not enough people are talking about it.

The Biden administration ruled on Oct. 8 that water companies would have 10 more years to replace nearly all of the country’s lead pipes, according to The New York Times.

While the ruling puts American cities on the path to a better future, it masks a major flaw in the plan.

The new rule does not require utilities to replace the portion of main lines on private property. This responsibility would fall on the homeowners.

The harsh reality is that lead lines are disproportionately found in low-income people. minority communities who can’t afford to shell out $4,500 dollars to replace the lead lines that run into your homes and poison your water supply.

Kamala Harris is critical of the racial disparity prevalent in this health crisis, but has not presented a clear proposal on how to address these problems.

About 9.2 million lead pipes make up the national service line infrastructure, according to a report from the Environmental Protection Agency. There is a high concentration of lead pipes in the Rust Belt, and Ohio and Illinois are listed as two of the 50 states with the highest levels of lead service lines.

My hometown of Cleveland has lead poisoning levels nearly four times the national average, according to News 5 Cleveland. To put this in perspective, Flint, MI, in 2016 reported elevated lead levels in children of 7% to 10%, while Cleveland sees about 12% to 13% of children with elevated lead levels, and some neighborhoods They reach rates close to 25%. according Case Occidental Reserve.

If residents of some of America’s largest cities are not safe from contaminated drinking water, who is? This is a national emergency and will require a president who believes in funding and coordinated action to eliminate lead pipes.

No amount of lead exposure is safe. High levels of lead exposure can cause serious damage to the brain and nervous system, according to the World Health Organization. Children can suffer a variety of repercussions including lower IQ, behavioral changes, anemia, and cardiovascular disease.

Joe Biden and Kamala Harris have described the recent ruling as a breakthrough for communities with aging housing stock and relying on corroded lead service pipes across the United States.

The decision shows a commitment to fulfilling promises made by Biden in 2021 on replacing lead service lines following former President Donald Trump’s decision. updates 2020 The lead and copper rules reduced the replacement rate of known or suspected lead lines per year from 7% to 3%. Biden Infrastructure Law It also allocates $15 billion to replace lead service lines.

While the Biden-Harris ruling may be historic, it is simply not enough to address this environmental, racial, and class injustice. Federal systems need to be implemented that require cities to reimburse homeowners who replace their lead lines with copper, as seen in Madison, Wisconsin.

America owes its people clean water, and the government owes its cities help during this time of need.