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A sample of 201 inner city dwelling children age 5.5 years was assessed on a wide variety of cognitive, performance, neuropsychological and behavioural measures. Extensive sociodemographic and family indices were also assessed. Body burden of lead was derived from a venous sample of blood. Data were analysed using both univariate and multivariate techniques. Results show that the initial correlations

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The pulmonary disorder known as byssinosis (Prausnitz, 1936;Caminita, Baum, Neal, and Schneiter, 1947) which affects the operatives in the card-rooms of cotton spinning mills is usually attributed to the high concentrations of dust in the card-room air. The concentration of airborne bacteria has, however, been found to be abnormally high in these rooms; and also the counts of viable bacteria and fungi in cotton waste extracted by machines and air-cleaning plant in mills spinning raw cotton (see also Furness and Maitland, 1952). Although byssinosis may take 20 years to develop and cannot be due to bacterial infection in the ordinary sense, the possibility of dead and viable microorganisms in cotton dust playing some part in its aetiology cannot be excluded.The survey of counts was initially carried out in card-rooms in full production in eight spinning mills chosen to cover a variety of types: two mills spinning mainly Egyptian cotton, two mills spinning mainly American cottoh, two mills spinning mainly Indian cotton, one cotton waste spinning mill, one rayon spinning mill. The results are given in Table 1 In a normal card-room processing raw cotton on rotating flat cards the bacterial count among the cards in production is exceptionally high, running usually to several thousands per cubic foot.In the same card-room, but among the speed frames and away from the cards, a much lower count of the order of 500 to 1,000 per cu. ft. is found. A similar reduction was found when the sampler was moved from cards processing cotton to others processing rayon staple fibre in the same room (Table 1, Mill No. 5). Even these lower counts are high by ordinary standards.ln the pre-carding processes on raw cotton (cotton mixing, blow-room) the counts are comparable with those between cotton cards in production in spite of the more enclosed nature of the machinery, but local variations of concentration are probably more marked than in the card-room.In the spinning rooms the counts are mostly of the order of 50 to 200 per cu. ft., which are numerically comparable with those found in such rooms as a canteen or a crowded office, though as Hamlin shows below, the types of organisms present are still those characteristic of the card-room rather than of a room with a relatively high human population.Plates