Rhesus monkeys were reared on diets designed to produce blood lead concentrations of 14 (untreated), 55, or 85 micrograms per 100 milliliters for the first year of life. Eighteen months later, blood lead levels were normal in all animals. At this time, however, visual discrimination performance in the 85-microgram group was impaired under dim light relative both to their own performance under bright light and to the performance of the other groups under all light levels used. We interpret these results to reflect a deleterious, enduring impairment of scotopic visual function (night blindness) as a result of early lead intoxication.
Experiments were conducted measuring the gastrointestinal absorption and elimination of a single dose of lead-210 acetate in infant and adult rhesus monkeys. Urinary and fecal excretion of absorbed lead was followed for 23 days. Infant monkeys eliminated less and absorbed more orally administered lead. Adult animals excreted more absorbed lead in feces, while urinary excretion between adults and infants was similar. Increased absorption of administered lead and reduced fecal excretion of absorbed lead resulted in significantly greater body burden of lead-210 in infant animals. Blood lead values were increased in the infant animals, and were inversely correlated with body burden and percent absorption of ingested lead.
Female rhesus monkeys and marmosets were fed a diet containing blighted potatoes (Phytophthora infestans) at a level of 10g/kg per day for at least two weeks prior to breeding and six weeks following conception in order to gain additional information on the association of blighted potatoes and the development of anencephaly and spina bifida in primate species. There was an absence of either of these neural-tube defects in 32 rhesus and 14 marmoset infants whose mothers had received a blighted potato diet. In addition there were no cranial osseous defects. There were, however, two rhesus monkey infants with internal hydrocephalus whose mothers had consumed blighted potatoes.
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