Petrol vendors, capillary blood lead levels and contamination.

It was recently claimed in a Tasmanian study that the mean blood lead level of 48 petrol vendors in Hobart, Tasmania, was 32-9 microng/100 ml, compared with 14-3 microng/100 ml for controls, and that seven individuals had blood lead levels above 40 microng/100 ml. In the present study, the blood lead levels of 20 service station workers in Melbourne and 20 controls were determined, both capillary and venous samples being used. The results obtained on capillary samples were similar to those of the Tasmanian study. However, the venous samples gave much lower results; the mean venous blood lead level of the service station workers was 18-2 microng/100 ml and that of the control group was 10-9 microng/100 ml. It was concluded that the blood lead levels obtained in the Tasmanian study were falsely high, because of contamination of the capillary samples, and that the blood lead levels of service station workers in Melbourne are not above the accepted "level of concern".