Vast African dump poisons children - U.N.

One of Africa's largest rubbish mountains, the 30-acre Dandora site in Nairobi, is seriously harming children's health and polluting the Kenyan capital, a report said on Friday.

Located near slums in east Nairobi, the open dump receives some 2,000 tonnes of the city's rubbish daily. Maribu storks and other scavengers pick over the noxious heap, while scores of people including children try to make a living off the remains.

The study, commissioned by the Nairobi-based U.N. Environment Programme (UNEP), found that half of 328 children tested had concentrations of lead in their blood exceeding the internationally accepted level.

Exposed to pollutants from heavy metals and toxic substances in soil, water and air, almost half the children tested were also suffering respiratory diseases, including chronic bronchitis and asthma, a UNEP statement said.

Nearly half of soil samples from the area had lead levels almost 10 times higher than unpolluted samples.

"The Dandora site may pose some special challenges for the city of Nairobi and Kenya as a nation. But it is also a mirror to the condition of rubbish sites across many parts of Africa and other urban centres of the developing world," said UNEP head Achim Steiner, exhorting city leaders to remedy the situation.

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