The Industrial Revolution had uneven health impacts in England
- A new study reveals that the Industrial Revolution had uneven health impacts across England, challenging the traditional narrative of industrial cities being uniformly polluted.
- The researchers used a combination of historical evidence and bone geochemistry to analyze skeletal remains from two towns, one industrial (South Shields) and one rural (Barton-upon-Humber), to trace how industrial pollution accumulated in the body over a lifetime.
- Exposure to toxic elements common in industrial goods did not follow a simple urban vs. rural divide, but instead varied significantly by sex and biosocial identity, with females having higher concentrations of arsenic and barium than males in their own community and from other areas.
- The study provides evidence to guide policy and protect vulnerable populations from similar exposures in the future, echoing challenges faced by marginalized communities today, such as the lead water crisis in Flint, Michigan.
- The research highlights the value of bioarchaeological data in reconstructing the lived past and offers a more nuanced understanding of how industrial change shaped health during one of history’s most transformative periods.
A new study reveals the Industrial Revolution’s uneven health impacts across England.
The findings, published in the journal Science Advances, challenge the longstanding narrative that industrial cities were uniformly polluted while rural communities remained comparatively untouched during the rise of polluting industries.
The key to the success of this investigation was combining a wealth of historical evidence such as sex, age, and occupational data with bone geochemistry and isotopic analysis. This approach allowed the research team from the University of Miami, Ohio State University, Michigan State University, and the Smithsonian Institution to examine skeletal remains from 94 individuals from two 18th–19th century towns—industrial South Shields and rural Barton-upon-Humber—to trace how industrial pollution accumulated in the body over a lifetime.
This direct physiological record offers an objective view of past health, bypassing the biases and gaps of written history and revealing how people experienced industrialization. The team sampled long bones (primarily femora) from adults and adolescents to measure concentrations of arsenic, barium, and lead—heavy metal contaminants that accumulate in bone and provide a reliable marker of chronic exposure. This method allowed the researchers to reconstruct lifetime contact with key industrial pollutants and compare exposure patterns across communities, sexes, and social identities.
A significant finding of this study is that exposure to toxic elements common in industrial goods did not follow a simple “urban vs. rural” divide but instead formed a broad spectrum shaped by local industry, social context, and individual identity. Notably, pollution exposure varied significantly by sex and biosocial identity: in industrial South Shields, females had markedly higher concentrations of arsenic and barium than both males in their own community and females from the agrarian town of Barton-upon-Humber.
“Examining the experiences of people in South Shields and Barton-upon-Humber not only allows us to uncover past injustices but also provides evidence to guide policy and protect vulnerable populations from similar exposures in the future,” says the lead author Sara McGuire from Nashua Community College, Seton Hall University, and the Smithsonian Institution.
“This historical pattern echoes challenges faced by marginalized communities today, such as the lead water crisis in Flint, Michigan,”
“This work is a rare collaboration between anthropologists and isotope geochemists to give a glimpse into the lives of individuals through the rising pollution of the Industrial era,” says the study’s corresponding author Ali Pourmand, a professor of geosciences at the University of Miami’s Rosenstiel School of Marine, Atmospheric, and Earth Science.
“One of our main challenges was to disentangle the signature of heavy metals that were accumulated during the lifetime of an individual from potential contamination caused after burial when the bones came into contact with the soil over centuries.”
This was accomplished by contrasting the isotopic signature of Pb (Lead) and Sr (Strontium) in soil from the burial locations and for all 94 individuals using the multi-collector mass spectrometer at the Neptune Isotope Lab at the Rosenstiel School.
“The isotopic composition of burial soil and the bone samples were significantly different. This provided the crucial evidence we needed to argue the heavy metals measured in the bones were the result of lived experiences of those individuals.” Pourmand adds.
By revealing the complexity of pollution exposure during one of history’s most transformative periods, the study offers a more nuanced understanding of how industrial change shaped health—and highlights the value of bioarchaeological data in reconstructing the lived past.
This study was in part funded through the Neptune Isotope Lab at the Rosenstiel School.
Source: University of Miami
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