Unlike most parents, but Pan Xiaoxia dreads watching her 12-year-old start the new semester.

She fears for the health of her daughter whose class is just a few hundred meters from a lead smelting plant that was closed after 851 children fell ill with lead poisoning.

"I'm just a farmer. I cannot afford to transfer my child to another school," says Pan in front of the gate of the Wudaokou village school, in Changqing Township, Fengxiang County of Baoji City, Shaanxi Province, her eyes fixed on the chimney of the Dongling Lead and Zinc Smelting Company.

"Kids need to go to school. And all parents want them to be safe. But there is not much we can do," she says.

Sun Yuping, of Sunjianantou Village, considered transferring her son, but a school further away would have entailed extra charges for board and lodging or long hours of travel.

Parents of the children found to have excessive lead levels in their blood are anxiously waiting for an official decision on the case.

Director Wang Hai'ao, of the Baoji Environmental Protection Bureau, told Xinhua that a new assessment of the Dongling plant was underway, but the results would not be released for at least a week.

Wang suspects the accuracy of the most recent appraisal released on Aug. 15, which concluded, based on samples of air, soil and water, that the factory's metal discharges met national standards.

"We found those samples were taken after the factory had some of its machines turned off for maintenance. That could blunt the reliability of the assessment," he said.

The local government has set up infirmaries in all 10 village primary schools and the junior high school in Changqing Township. Each school is to have one physician to take care of the students.

The children know by heart that the normal blood lead level for children is below 100 mg per liter and that they should consume more milk, dried vegetables, nuts and kelp to expel lead from the body.

High lead levels can harm nerve and reproductive systems, cause high blood pressure and anemia. In severe cases, it can lead to convulsions, coma and even death.

Of the 851 children aged 14 and under who were found to have excess lead levels, 174 were considered serious and needed hospitalization.

Ten teachers have been dispatched by the city government to four local hospitals to help the sick students keep up with their studies.

The Ministry of Health also dispatched experts to Fengxiang to help local medical workers treat the sick children. Children aged 14 and under in another six villages are also having their blood tested.

Anger and fear

Wudaokou villager Liang Zhongxiao, 72, still has the yellow brochure distributed by the county authority on August 23, 2003, depicted the smelting plant as a "garden-like factory".

It says that the Dongling Group was among China's top 100 private companies in 2001 and that the plant would benefit local people.

"We were all cheated," says Liang, brandishing the brochure in anger. "Not only children but adults were harmed."

His oldest son, Liang Keyu, worked as a casual laborer in the factory in 2007 and 2008. Blood tests showed the amount of lead in his blood was 537.5 mg per liter, much higher than the normal level for adults of 400 mg.

"Tests showed many workers had excess lead in their blood. In response to our complaints, the management provided free drugs," Liang Keyu says. Workers whose blood lead level exceeded 600 mg per liter were hospitalized.

Qi Jian, of Wudaokou, who had been working for the factory for five years was found to have a blood-lead level of 830 mg per liter in 2007. After medical treatment twice, it had dropped to 330 mg in May.

A worker surnamed Ma fears for the health of his son and his job. "If the factory was permanently closed I would be jobless," he says.

His son, Ma Zuqi, had been in the Fengxiang County Hospital for a week after his blood lead level was tested at 374 mg per liter.

Despite doctors' assurances that the drugs were safe, Ma worries that his three-year-old might suffer harmful side effects.

With his home in the danger zone -- 500 meters of the factory -- Ma and another 580 families should have been relocated to somewhere safer before the company commenced production.

Only 156 families however have moved to new homes so far, while 425 families remained.

Villager Liang Linqiang, 46, says, "The government said in 2003they would move us away by 2008. But they never mentioned that later and we saw no action either."

Several hundred villagers staged an angry protest on Aug. 17, and the county government quickly mapped out four relocation options: a site 3 kilometers away, another 5 kilometers away, the township, or Baoji City.

Under the plans, villagers could choose either new farmland or surrender their land for cash and grain from a government-sponsored cultivation company.

A mother staying with her 9-year-old son, Ma Shilong, in Fengxiang County hospital, however, complains about the complicated decisions.

"Can relocation address our concerns once for all? I don't know whether our drinking water and the soil have been polluted. Frankly speaking, I don't want to leave my home, but on the other hand, I can not leave my boy at risk of lead pollution," she says, declining to give her name.

The fear has spread fast. In the relatively distant Gaojutou and Luobosi Villages, parents are demanding the factory is removed and their children receive free blood tests.

Lessions to be drawn

The county government is trying to defuse public anger.

Sources with the smelting plant say that in the protest on August17, villagers dismantled fences around a rail line reserved for the company, and smashed trucks and other vehicles. Some attempted, unsuccessfully, to break into the accounting office.

The coal gas valve of the factory canteen was also destroyed, but its early discovery prevented greater harm, they say.

Government officials and police officers were dispatched to the affected villages immediately after the conflict.

Baoji Mayor Dai Zhengshe apologized for the lead poisoning and promised to pay all medical bills for the sick children and accelerate relocation.

He said a thorough relocation plan, to be implemented within two years, would be published in two months.

Vice Mayor Xu Qiang also promised at a public hearing last week that the smelter would be banned from production until all villagers were safe.

County government officials say transparency and information disclosure will be vital, as the conflict on August 17 resulted from misunderstanding and misrepresentation.

They cite Dongling's coking plant, which pumps out pollutants other than lead and is still operating despite the closure of the factory's lead and zinc production on August 6.

That led some villagers to think the factory was discharging lead pollutants in defiance of the order. Public fury was fanned by the news that teenager Ma Jiaojiao attempted to commit suicide by drinking pesticide after her blood lead level was found to be abnormally high.

Officials say the 19-year-old, in fact, had a family quarrel after her request for a blood test was denied by her parents. Subsequent laboratory tests showed her blood-lead level was normal.

Villagers are also demanding to know why relocation was behind schedule.

Pu Yiming, who became Changqing Township chief last year, gives two reasons: "One is that the government had been working on the new plan of the smelter's industry zone; the other is the villagers' reluctance to leave their land.

"Whatever the reasons, the environment and the health of the public should not be sacrificed for economic development," he says.

The smelter, which produces zinc, lead and coke, accounted for 17 percent of Fengxiang County's GDP last year. It contributed 123 million yuan (US$18 million) in taxes and generated 24 million yuan, or one sixth, of the county government's total fiscal revenue.

(Xinhua News Agency August 30, 2009)