Evil lead!

[Art Caputo]

The issue with lead in the context of how we use it is the formation of the white residue that forms with age. It’s lead carbonate formed by the lead complexing with carbon dioxide, as a result of decomposition over time. This white residue is highly toxic and can be absorbed through the mouth, lungs and skin. There is little doubt that this wouldn’t effect miners. As recent as the second half of the 20th century the white residue was used a paint pigment by mixing with various oils(ie linseed). This, as well as it being a primary ingredient of asbestos, plumbing materials, etc., is what brought much of the attention to lead. It was quickly picked up by the anti-gun nuts and propagandized.

 

[David Veale]

It's not evil in my book at all but I got to wondering just, was there or is there any accounts from wayyyy back of lead miners getting lead associated diseases?
Our poliliticaly correct TV last week was going on and on and on about how lead shot COULD make you ill.
It a bit like tales of black powder could blow your barrel apart, especially if you use 4f but alas the proof still evades me.
I digress, so did lead miners of old get ill?

Where is Spence when you need him....

The danger is real. A friend and his wife remodeled their old house, not knowing or paying attention to all the lead paint they were spreading around. Their kid started having mental issues and got tested -- lead levels were sky high. Been on meds and a little "off" ever since.

A coworker's father was a plumber who dealt with lots of lead in solder and pipes. According to her, he's now batshit insane, living in a trailer in the CA desert somewhere.

A friend of mine who does remodeling professionally went through training on lead remediation. He was told that a small chip of lead paint the size of your pinky nail, if ingested by a child, will create a measurable drop in IQ. Kids are especially susceptible because it affects how their brain develops.

I remember a number of years back, one of the first mass shootings in the US at a McDonalds in California. The guy who did it (unlike most, who are on SSRIs nowadays) had very high lead levels from occupational exposure, which is what made him nuts.

 

[Marc Schmidt]

I believe the downfall of Rome was caused by the five liters of wine a day rather than lead poisoning. But yes, lead (II) acetate, known as lead sugar because it tastes sweet and is easily soluble in water, was used as a sugar substitute (defrutum) until the 19th century - it was used to sweeten wine in particular.

Elemental lead as used in/as our bullets can mainly be absorbed through the lungs in the form of dust. In contrast, lead is hardly absorbed through the skin. Therefore, elemental lead in compact form is not toxic to humans. In the air, metallic lead forms a dense, poorly water-soluble protective layer made of lead carbonate. That's the normal dark layer on the outside of your bullets. Dissolved lead compounds and lead dust, which can get into the body through ingestion or inhalation, are toxic. Organic lead compounds (Lead hydroxide carbonate mostly used in lead paint) are particularly toxic, e.g. B. Tetraethyl lead (prohibited anti-knock agents in gasoline), which are highly lipophilic and are quickly absorbed through the skin.

As far as I can tell, lead is most dangerous to shooters when chewed or sucked on it frequently, and when casting bullets without adequate ventilation. Oh yes, and washing your hands more often wouldn't be bad either.

 

[Flintlock]

I believe the downfall of Rome was caused by the five liters of wine a day rather than lead poisoning. But yes, lead (II) acetate, known as lead sugar because it tastes sweet and is easily soluble in water, was used as a sugar substitute (defrutum) until the 19th century - it was used to sweeten wine in particular.

Elemental lead as used in/as our bullets can mainly be absorbed through the lungs in the form of dust. In contrast, lead is hardly absorbed through the skin. Therefore, elemental lead in compact form is not toxic to humans. In the air, metallic lead forms a dense, poorly water-soluble protective layer made of lead carbonate. That's the normal dark layer on the outside of your bullets. Dissolved lead compounds and lead dust, which can get into the body through ingestion or inhalation, are toxic. Organic lead compounds (Lead hydroxide carbonate mostly used in lead paint) are particularly toxic, e.g. B. Tetraethyl lead (prohibited anti-knock agents in gasoline), which are highly lipophilic and are quickly absorbed through the skin.

As far as I can tell, lead is most dangerous to shooters when chewed or sucked on it frequently, and when casting bullets without adequate ventilation. Oh yes, and washing your hands more often wouldn't be bad either.

Well I'm a proffesional chef as well as a caster and am not going to wash my hands every dang day.

 

[RonRC]

Lead toxicity depends on the chemical conditions surrounding it and the dose.

There is no known physiological use for lead in the body. We do require heavy metals like iron. As a result, it takes very high levels of iron to become toxic. Lead, on the other hand, is toxic at very low levels.

Most heavy metals (lead, cadmium, etc.) become more soluble in water as the acidity increases. If you are a victim of high-velocity lead (you've been shot), the body may isolate the solid lead, and leaching into the rest of the body can be slow. Ingest that same piece of lead and the extremely acid conditions of your digestive tract will dissolve it and send that lead in your bloodstream and around your body.

The lead you inhale is another source of lead in the bloodstream due to the large surface area of the lungs to absorb the lead.

Handling lead for bullets is not particularly risky because that lead is not in an acid environment. It does make sense to wash your hands after handling it.

Melting lead releases lead vapors that can be very dangerous. Good air circulation is necessary to avoid excess lead in the body.

In the former Soviet Union, entire industrial towns were sacrificed in the name of industrial production (usually in Soviet countries other than Russia). With no environmental controls of lead emissions, lead was very high in the air and in the blood of children. The breathing in of the lead in the air and ingestion of lead particles in the house and from the soil resulted in stunted brain development, behavior problems, learning disabilities.

What about all that lead in the ground at the shooting range? It's not particularly dangerous, but can be problematic if it sits there for years. Natural rain is slightly acidic with a pH of around 5.6 (pH of 7 is neutral). So, rain can dissolve the lead in the soil and the lead mobilizes and moves down through the soil. It's a slow process and is not a big risk as long as there isn't a shallow water table below the lead-filled surface.

If the lead is recovered every several years from the soil and backstops, there is no problem and the recovered lead can be sold.

Acid rain, impacted by emissions of sulfates to form sulfuric acid, can be as low as pH 3, about the same as vinegar. Acid rain has the potential of leaching significant amounts of lead into the ground. We have made significant progress over the years to reduce acid rain and it is no longer a major problem in the USA.

I've worked closely with the mining industry for 30 years. I have been an expert witness FOR shooting ranges in cases where neighbors of the range have claimed that the range is spreading lead pollution into the area. I have designed studies that have shown little to no lead problems from the shooting range. I'm now off to load lead pellets into my pellet gun to shoot in my basement BB and pellet gun range.

 

[JCKelly]

Wasn’t lead used in dentistry?

Mercury was used, along with silver, by my childhood dentist to make tooth fillings.

 

[user 51067]

The big lead scare a decade ago, was just to get rid of lead so no one could make ammo from it.
What the wheel weights are made of today is just as deadly, just cant make bullets out of it.
Im pushing 70, and we used to play with lead nodules in eastern Washington as a kid. Been casting for decades. Still healthy and ornery as ever.

Wheel weights make outstanding projectiles for unmentionables!

 

[Nuthatch]

With the much shorter life expectancy of the times, especially among common laborers...Good chance many of the longer term affects werent as noticeable as they would be today. A lot of folks were considered in thier old age by the late thirties. Coal mining, mills, quarrying, lumbering....all took a very high toll on the workers.

A common misconception. Life expectancy at birth was around age 30 or 40 due to about 40% infant mortality. Conditional life expectancy for adults was age 70-80, not far off of today. There’s archaeological evidence of all that but consider an old book’s contribution:

Psalm 90:10
King James Version
10 The days of our years are threescore years and ten; and if by reason of strength they be fourscore years, yet is their strength labour and sorrow; for it is soon cut off, and we fly away.

 

[Nuthatch]

Rome fell because it was too big. The rest is just detail and color.
Always gives me pause when I hear economists and politicians sing the praises of “growth.”

 

[Cattywompuss]

So is benzene in gas . So is uranium, plutonium, we have lead in car batteries.
Radiographers use lead. Zinc is not a friendly metal but it is coated on steel everywhere.
Iron oxide is unhealthy, can cause cancer but no one gets in a flap about that.
It may just be me, but are not shooting and hunting folk an easy and soft target?

You named a bunch of stuff people avoid consuming and touching because we know they are toxic. Thanks for supporting my points.

 

[Cattywompuss]

Not to be a nitpicker but the Roman empire only began in 27 BCE and lasted until 330 CE. Prior it was a Republic and after it was two separate governing empires. By 1453 it was hardly Roman at all, certainly no more Rome than Charlemagne's holy Roman empire.

The Mediterranean cultures and empires throughout history show us how ephemeral power is even where people can see no way it could fail.

I love history and have a particular interest in Carthage and the Punic wars, and the Gallic wars and Vercingetorix.

Anyway back to lead...

We can PM/DM about this if you want to have a real argument, but you may want to expand your study of Rome if that is your timeline. If you ask a 10th Century Byzantine citizen where they lived, the answer would be an affirmative for "The Roman Empire".

We call them Byzantine(a modern phrase). They did not call themselves that. They called themselves Roman. And even Roman senators referred to "Our Empire" long before Augustus. Even before the first Triumvirate.

 

[Britsmoothy]

You named a bunch of stuff people avoid consuming and touching because we know they are toxic. Thanks for supporting my points.

If its OK for the military to shoot the environment up with depleted uranium I'm good with lead.

 

[Cattywompuss]

If its OK for the military to shoot the environment up with depleted uranium I'm good with lead.

Depleted means "no longer radioactive". The density of depleted Uranium is why it is used. It punctures armor well from an A-10's canon. But by all means, eat all the lead you like.

 

[davec2]

Bodies are pretty good at isolating foreign objects - walling them off so they're separated. Even cancer gets encysted, and best left that way rather than a doc cutting into it which allows it to spread.

As far as the Roman Empire, I've heard its downfall was Christianity. Towards the end it was pretty degraded with things like watching guys dying fighting wild animals and each other in the Coliseum, orgies, and stuff like that. Then the Christians came along and said "Go ahead and kill me, this isn't my only life. I won't go along with your crummy games." (all references to past lives were edited out of the bible at some point - I don't recall when) It's pretty tough on soldiers murdering good, decent people who weren't even resisting. They had controlled by threat of death and when that was challenged, it collapsed. Of course, the empire was on its way down anyway but who knows how much longer it might have continued.

Well.....just as a follow on thought....the Eastern half of the Roman Empire converted to Christianity (in ~ 313 AD) and lasted for another thousand years until the fall of Constantinople on May 29, 1453.... So they made it for another 10 centuries with lead pipes, and "sugar of lead" in their wine, stained glass windows, etc., etc. Personally I don't think lead or Christianity had anything to do with the fall of Rome. Now if you want to talk about bad political leadership, welfare in the form of "bread & games", political corruption, open boarders, and the like....now you would be on to something.

Merry Christmas !!

 

[Britsmoothy]

Depleted means "no longer radioactive". The density of depleted Uranium is why it is used. It punctures armor well from an A-10's canon. But by all means, eat all the lead you like.

Oh really?
https://www.epa.gov/radtown/depleted-uranium

 

[powderhombre]

Although diagnosed by the medical standard of the day Annie Oakley died of Toxic Anemia. It is now believed to be lead poisoning from the thousands and thousands of lead ammunition she handled and most likely ingested though cross contamination .

 

[Daveboone]

A common misconception. Life expectancy at birth was around age 30 or 40 due to about 40% infant mortality. Conditional life expectancy for adults was age 70-80, not far off of today. There’s archaeological evidence of all that but consider an old book’s contribution:

Psalm 90:10
King James Version
10 The days of our years are threescore years and ten; and if by reason of strength they be fourscore years, yet is their strength labour and sorrow; for it is soon cut off, and we fly away.

Simply not true in real time. In the 1800s urban life expectancy was in the twenties and thirties due to rampant disease, horrific sanitation, starvation, brutal unregulated work environments...sure a small rich population lived longer, but still think of the modern numbers of diabetics, heart disease patients, inherited conditions uncounted that live to old age now that died due to the lack of diagnosis/medications? Just due to simple infections (people frequently died from a simple tooth infection). Rural life expectancies were better due to the less crowded conditions, but living to the forties qualified as old age. Sure, conditionally folks were able to live to the modern equivalent of old age, but only the very rare individual did.

 

[Okie Hog]

For 20 years i was a US Army Explosive Ordnance Disposal guy. Spent 30 more years doing the same stuff as a civilian. Burned hundreds of millions, maybe a few billion, rounds of US and foreign military small arms ammunition.

Last big burning job took place in 1991-92 when i managed the destruction of about 18, 000 tons of all types of unserviceable US Army ammunition from Desert Storm, including hundreds of tons of small arms ammunition. Initially we burned small arms ammo in pits that were cleaned out for re-use. Later we covered the pits after the burns.

After the job ended i took an OSHA physical for another job. My lead levels were sky high. Every day i took large doses of vitamin C, within a month my lead levels were normal.

i knew about vitamin C from reading a case that took in the late 1930s where numerous workers at a plant were poisoned with lead.

Vitamin C Treatment in Lead Poisoning. (cabdirect.org)

 

[Cattywompuss]

Oh really?
https://www.epa.gov/radtown/depleted-uranium

Indeed really. I realize you think your making a point. But your actually just advocating nonsense. Lead poisoning is real. Third world countries even recognize this reality. And "good enough for the U.S. military" is not something anyone who has been in it would say.

 

[Robby]

Rome fell because they weren't Romans anymore.
Robby