Half of US Adults Exposed To Harmful Lead Levels As Kids (apnews.com) 111
Over 170 million U.S.-born people who were adults in 2015 were exposed to harmful levels of lead as children, a new study estimates. The Associated Press reports: Researchers used blood-lead level, census and leaded gasoline consumption data to examine how widespread early childhood lead exposure was in the country between 1940 and 2015. In a paper published in the Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences on Monday, they estimated that half the U.S. adult population in 2015 had been exposed to lead levels surpassing five micrograms per deciliter -- the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention threshold for harmful lead exposure at the time.
The scientists from Florida State University and Duke University also found that 90% of children born in the U.S. between 1950 and 1981 had blood-lead levels higher than the CDC threshold. And the researchers found significant impact on cognitive development: on average, early childhood exposure to lead resulted in a 2.6-point drop in IQ. The researchers only examined lead exposure caused by leaded gasoline, the dominant form of exposure from the 1940s to the late 1980s, according to data from the U.S. Geological Survey. Leaded gasoline for on-road vehicles was phased out starting in the 1970s, then finally banned in 1996.
The scientists from Florida State University and Duke University also found that 90% of children born in the U.S. between 1950 and 1981 had blood-lead levels higher than the CDC threshold. And the researchers found significant impact on cognitive development: on average, early childhood exposure to lead resulted in a 2.6-point drop in IQ. The researchers only examined lead exposure caused by leaded gasoline, the dominant form of exposure from the 1940s to the late 1980s, according to data from the U.S. Geological Survey. Leaded gasoline for on-road vehicles was phased out starting in the 1970s, then finally banned in 1996.
hmmm (Score:2)
Re:hmmm (Score:4, Interesting)
Leaded gasoline was invented by Thomas Midgley [wikipedia.org], who also invented chlorofluorocarbon-based refrigerants and propellants.
If you ever build a time machine, instead of going back in time to kill Hitler, it may be better for humanity to kill Thomas Midgley.
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Time travel will never be a reality because of decreasing IQs.
Time travelers did this and you've fallen for it.
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Impy's Rule of Time Travel, invented 20 years ago: if time travel is possible, people will keep coming back in time and altering history until they screw things up so much time travel never happens again.
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Time travel will never be a reality because of decreasing IQs.
Perhaps some of us are having decreasing IQs, but by and large they are going up worldwide over the years.
https://ourworldindata.org/int... [ourworldindata.org]
Everybody blames old Thomas (Score:2)
I never understand why we blame scientists for inventing bad things instead of the oligarchs and aristocrats who take the bad things and put them into place.
I mean I understood pre-internet because we didn't know what an aristocracy or an oligarch was but we've had enough information and enough time
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I never understand why we blame scientists for inventing bad things instead of the oligarchs
I didn't say he should be blamed. I only said that he should be killed.
Killing the oligarchs does no good because another will take their place. There is no shortage of unethical capitalists.
But kill the inventor, and you have eliminated the problem at the source. It is a utilitarian solution.
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I didn't say he should be blamed. I only said that he should be killed.
I mean, wouldn't it be morally and ethically better to just materialize in front of him and say: "I'm a time traveler from the future. I have to warn you about the unforeseen long-term consequences of your inventions. Since I'm violating causality anyway, here are some plans for environmentally safe technologies from my time for propelling vehicles, generating power, and refrigerating and for manufacturing processes to produce those things. Live long and prosper." I mean, why would murder be necessary?
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He knew the lead was a problem. He knew that his scheme would spew it into the environment. He knew of more expensive but less harmful additives. So he would just laugh in your face and press on.
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He knew the lead was a problem. He knew that his scheme would spew it into the environment. He knew of more expensive but less harmful additives. So he would just laugh in your face and press on.
He knew lead was poisonous, I'm sure. In the 1920s though, there were 1/38th as many cars as there are today and the general philosophy was that the solution to pollution was dilution. It's likely he thought of lead poisoning in terms of acute poisoning instead of effects on development and lifelong cumulative effects. He probably just thought that people would only get poisoned unless they had their heads in front of the car's exhaust and that released lead would just vanish in the environment. As for the
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For me as a European, I see US laws as being backwards.
Before a chemical product is introduced onto the market, the producer should have the responsibility of proving it safe.
Instead, in the US, the norm is that products are only removed after they have been proven dangerous -- after the damage has already been done.
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Perhaps you should read up on the history of leaded gas.
Every country in Europe used it and most continued to use it into the 1990s despite overwhelming evidence it was harmful.
Re: Everybody blames old Thomas (Score:2)
A lot of European countries also used two-stroke fuel in their cars. Oh, and emissions cheating is legal in the EU.
Re: Everybody blames old Thomas (Score:2)
Before a chemical product is introduced onto the market, the producer should have the responsibility of proving it safe.
THC, for example.
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There's plenty of blame to go around, and it should go around. However, Midgley KNEW that leaded gasoline was harmful and that several slightly more expensive solutions would be a lot less harmful. He was a willing toady. A fair portion of that blame is rightly his.
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Leaded gasoline was invented by Thomas Midgley [wikipedia.org], who also invented chlorofluorocarbon-based refrigerants and propellants.
If you ever build a time machine, instead of going back in time to kill Hitler, it may be better for humanity to kill Thomas Midgley.
Someone is going to have to take the lead on this one...
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Interestingly, he was finally strangled by one of his own inventions. I hesitate to laugh at a man's demise, but I can't deny a certain appropriateness.
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It's a bit less funny perhaps when you consider that the invention was a pulley arrangement to lift himself out of bed when he was left permanently disabled by Polio.
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Thus my hesitation to laugh.
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Fair enough, I just thought that the fact of it happening because he was crippled by Polio a decade before the vaccine adds that extra tragedy to it that makes it less funny. If he'd been strangled by a tie tying machine or a hug machine that he had invented it might be better material to find funny.
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My thought exactly.
High lead levels was proven to lead to smaller brains in humans decades ago, that's why the US congress was convinced to ban in it as additives in gasoline. At least that's what I have heard, I only have one source for this, I think it was LastWeekTonight.
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Actually, when GM introduced leaded gasoline (as an octane booster), GM already knew lead was bad. However, if you wanted a sporty car you needed a high octane gas, and the gas around at the time just wasn't good enough. But adding TEL (
Re: hmmm (Score:2)
High lead levels was proven to lead to smaller brains in humans decades ago
Greeks and Romans knew of lead's neurological effects 2000 years ago.
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Indeed, it does. Aggression and stupidity are main effects.
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And yet, do you think the US is more aggressive and warlike today, then is was during Vietnam? I would argue that things are worse today, because of media practices (stirring up contention) and declining educational standards.
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And yet, do you think the US is more aggressive and warlike today, then is was during Vietnam? I would argue that things are worse today, because of media practices (stirring up contention) and declining educational standards.
It is a group of effects, clearly, not a single one. And there are amplification effects as well, especially in the media. For example, they are stirring up things because they noticed that they can. So they are doing it more and hence it gets more accepted.
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And yet, do you think the US is more aggressive and warlike today, then is was during Vietnam? I would argue that things are worse today, because of media practices (stirring up contention) and declining educational standards.
Consider a few factors here. Leaded gasoline started being phased out around 1975 and was not fully banned until 1996. Contamination from something like that tends to build up in the environment, not to mention that there were more and more cars being produced each year until 1975 and beyond. That means that the actual level of contamination could be expected to be at its peak sometime around the late 70's or early 80's, but still very strong for decades before that. Probably closer to the early 80's. Also
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Actually, I think you are conflating something important here.
New cars being sold had to be built for unleaded in 1975 (it ruins catalytic converters which were also being mandated in this timeframe).
But those cars built up to 1975 continued to be used for quite awhile (in fact, it was probably 1980 or so before you would see demand for leaded fuel in aggregate dropping at all).
Transition was painful for some. Quite a few engines had soft valve seats that were engineered to get lubrication from the lead in
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Actually, I think you are conflating something important here.
What? Conflated what, exactly? All you did was point out that leaded gas started phaseout in 1975 and wasn't fully banned until later. I specifically noted that the process started in 1975 and it wasn't actually banned until 1996. You stated that "...in fact, it was probably 1980 or so before you would see demand for leaded fuel in aggregate dropping at all" and I wrote: "the actual level of contamination could be expected to be at its peak sometime around the late 70's or early 80's" which seems to be "...
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Thanks for clarifying, I misread your original post.
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And yet, do you think the US is more aggressive and warlike today, then is was during Vietnam? I would argue that things are worse today, because of media practices (stirring up contention) and declining educational standards.
"All is calm in Cuba. Stop."
"You privide the pictures; I'll provide the war." -- Charles Foster Kane in a movie from 1940 based on real newspapers from the 1890s.
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explains a lot!
Explains why Trump got approx. 50% of the vote?
Re: hmmm (Score:2)
The other half are paint-eaters.
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It's been my pet theory, or perhaps at least a vaguely informed conjecture, for a long time that one of the reasons the world has taken a turn for the worse in the last few decades is that it coincides with the "leaded generation" starting to come of age and into positions of power. We have a whole generation of folks with, on the average, a just a little bit less foresight, a little bit less self control, a little bit less empathy, a little bit smaller IQ running corporations and governments all over the
Damn (Score:2)
Re:Damn (Score:5, Informative)
Damned if I haven't been saying lead poisoning would explain a lot of attitudes we are seeing today.
You are just stating the obvious. The effects of lead exposure on IQ and anti-social behavior are well known.
Black children have twice the blood lead levels of white children.
Prison inmates have three times the average.
Perhaps we should spend less on prisons and more on removing heavy metal neurotoxins from our water and food.
Joe Biden's BBB plan includes money for lead abatement, so maybe Americans will be less stupid in the future.
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Well when I said it before, people told me I was crazy that there would be some sort of massive lead poisoning across the population.
The effects of leaded gasoline are well documented, and the switch to unleaded fuel involved hundreds of millions of car owners. The role of lead in the dramatic increase in crime during the 1960s and subsequent fall in the 1990s when the lead was removed from gasoline is also very well known.
Your claim that it is secret knowledge is silly.
Re: Damn (Score:2)
Yet you don't read about it a lot. And you will never hear it on Fox news, it interferes with the narrative where every criminal is a thug who deserves whatever they get instead of, in as much as half of all cases, a victim of circumstance. Maybe not on CNN either - too many sponsors would be upset.
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New to you doesn't mean new to the world and shouldn't be front-news on FOX/MSNBC/Etc.
The truth is we have much much much less lead now than we have had in at least 100 years. We also have less violent crime (the last two years notwithstanding).
You know conservatives often make the same association with "single parent households" and violence/thugs that you have made with lead (Fox certainly has), even though this too has been decreasing. Do you think this reason should be front-page news just like lead, or
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Even if a lot of us already know it, it can be good to have a reminder once in a while. Not to mention that release of information doesn't make it to everyone. Some people just don't know about it at all. I remember the first time I heard the term "mud room". I believe I was in my 30's and I had either never heard that term before, or just never registered it. All of a sudden there was this new term. It wasn't a new concept, of course, but it was a new name for it. To me at least.
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There are more factors than just one at play. I'm well aware that a (financially or otherwise) insecure situation while growing up has serious repercussions for a person, and by implication for the society around him or her as well.
Add to that, that risk factors tend to strengthen each other, and any mitigation of those factors is a good thing. The problem starts when incorrect mitigation increases all other factors. For instance, you could ban divorces, but abuse would rise. Which is not helping. Also, the
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https://www.foxnews.com/health... [foxnews.com]
You were saying?
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That story doesn't talk about the violence link, but this one does.
https://www.foxnews.com/story/... [foxnews.com]
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The effects of leaded gasoline are well documented,
Yep. It's a thing:
https://www.google.com/search?... [google.com]
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You probably are crazy, on account of the lead poisoning.
Oh, so that is why BBB can't pass! (Score:2)
BBB won't pass because some people need to keep Americans stupid. I remember the previous POTUS saying he loved the uneducated...
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For better or worse, the Build Back Better plan is going nowhere. Maybe it'll get broken up, and some portions passed piece-meal, but even that seems doubtful.
The good news, though, is that the 2021 Infrastructure Bill (which had some bipartisan support) has allocated $15 billion for replacing lead pipes across the country. It's probably not enough on its own, and it doesn't address the more p
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Of course, most of the problems that would lead to single mother families come down to the exact problems that come from lead poisoning. Such as impulse-control problems. Lead isn't the only thing though. Now that epigenetics are better understood, we know that the results of stress from poverty, malnutrition, oppression, etc. can actually be passed down through multiple generations, attached to DNA, but not permanently part of it. So this can perpetuate poverty and family strife and then the stresses of gr
Oblig (Score:2)
You mean wall candy?
https://www.penny-arcade.com/c... [penny-arcade.com]
deviation (Score:2)
We can't have a bell curve without 50% falling on the left side of it.
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We can't have a bell curve without 50% falling on the left side of it.
IQ is a normal distribution (bell curve) by definition.
A measure of absolute intelligence would show that there are a lot more stupid people than geniuses just because there are more ways to screw up a brain than to improve it. But that is not what IQ is. By definition, the mean IQ is 100 and the standard deviation is 15.
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there are more ways to screw up a brain than to improve it.
[citation needed]
See for example, https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/... [wikipedia.org]
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That link does not seem to support your theory. It specifically notes that the improvement in intelligence scores may be due to less malnutrition. Malnutrition is a way to screw up a brain much more than good nutrition is a way to improve it. If you deprive someone of good nutrition for the first 20 years of their life, then give them proper nutrition for the next 20, they are not normally going to be as intelligent as they would have if they were getting proper nutrition the whole time. It's just like the
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It's just like the GP said, there are a lot more ways to screw up a brain than to improve it.
Again, citation needed. There are a lot of ways to improve the brain.
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Well, you provided one. Average IQ rose due in part to better nutrition (also possibly less air pollution from unfiltered coal burning, and indoor fires that produce lots of particulates, etc.). The trouble is, a lot of it is a matter of perspective. If a large percentage of the population is missing an essential nutrient, like fat, during early childhood you might argue that providing a diet richer in fat for children improves their brains, whereas I might argue that the nutritional deficit is a factor tha
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So you don't have a citation.
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Are you joking? Please tell me you were just trying to be funny? If you actually think that's an argument it's pretty sad.
If you really, truly have so little basic knowledge of things that may cause brain damage that you actually need citations for the things I listed in my post, here are five:
Fetal alcohol spectrum disorder [wikipedia.org]
types of traumatic brain injury [brainline.org] covering head injuries and torsion, etc.
Stroke [wikipedia.org] See the section on "Cerebral hypoperfusion" if you specifically need to see the words "brain damage"
sleep d [resmed.com]
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That's not even science. I know that some things can cause brain damage. You are arguing against the wind, I already agree with you.
Science is creating a hypothesis and then attacking it (ie, trying to find a way to falsify it). Your hypothesis is that "there are a lot more ways to screw up a brain than to improve it." So how are you going to falsify that? Be scientific.
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Science is creating a hypothesis and then attacking it (ie, trying to find a way to falsify it). Your hypothesis is that "there are a lot more ways to screw up a brain than to improve it." So how are you going to falsify that? Be scientific.
We're not really doing science here, we're doing research. That is part of the scientific process so you can call it science if it's preliminary to actually forming a hypothesis and designing and performing an experiment, but it's not science in and of itself performed in isolation. It seemed to me pretty clear that the context of the original poster's claim that here are a lot more ways to screw up a brain that improve it was currently known and effective ways, not speculation about what may be available i
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In which case, the ways to improve a brain that actually exist now and are know can be researched and enumerated and compared against the known ways to screw up a brain.
Then do it. Or find a citation that has already done it, that might be easier.
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Then do it. Or find a citation that has already done it, that might be easier.
You want me to prove your assertion for you? To quote Charles Babbage: "I am not able rightly to apprehend the kind of confusion of ideas that could provoke such a question." How exactly would I be expected to find examples for you to prove your assertion? I disagree with your assertion precisely because I am aware of so few ways to improve the brain beyond simply avoiding things that damage it and I'm aware of so many ways to damage it. If there were many known, proven ways to actually improve the brain, I
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there are more ways to screw up a brain than to improve it.
[citation needed]
See for example, https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/... [wikipedia.org]
Invoking the Flynn effect kind of misses the point that it's not the same brain that's being measured at each time slot. If you need a citation for individual brain damage maybe look for neurological effects of aluminium or lead, various herbicides and pesticides, or trauma - then try to find studies demonstrating similar gains in brain function from ... well, taking or doing anything.
And one excellent explanation for the Flynn effect is the very subject under discussion - the reduction in environmental exp
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So what? You haven't shown that there are more ways to screw up a brain than improve it. There are lots of ways to do both.
And one excellent explanation for the Flynn effect is the very subject under discussion - the reduction in environmental exposure to lead
The link I posted discussed and quantified that. So no.
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But that is not what IQ is. By definition, the mean IQ is 100 and the standard deviation is 15.
Those that do not understand statistics shall be endlessly confuzzled by them.
Also, IQ does not include actual skill in applying it to problems or in perceiving reality. It is basically just computing power and does not give you wisdom. It can be used to construct filter-bubbles and denial-strategies just as readily as it can be used to analyse things and arrive at facts.
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We can't have a bell curve without 50% falling on the left side of it.
If you're limiting a bell curve to being a normal distribution with a skew of 0 then you are correct, but there are many curves [wikipedia.org] for which this relationship does not hold.
tl:dr It depends on how we define "bell curve", not to mention our reference point in defining left and right.
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In the context of this article.
Wow (Score:2)
Wow that explains me.
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And me!
explains a lot (Score:2)
no wonder a large part of the US population is stupid as *...
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> no wonder a large part of the US population is stupid as *...
At least half the US population has a below-average intelligence.
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Yep. Time to dust off Carlin's quote.
Thank Clair Patterson (Score:2)
Love me some Lead (Score:2)
I love lead. I used it a lot as a kid when soldering (or "soddering" for the yanks out there) to make radios and strobe lights and such.
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My Dad had lead soldiers and showed me how to use the lost wax process while melting lead just using the stove. I have absolutely no urge to touch lead now!
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Leaded solder has been pretty much banned in Europe, at much annoyance to the electronics tinkering community.
But the lead is not dangerous for the person using it - it is only bad if it gets released out into the environment.
It is the flux that causes smoke when soldering that is toxic to inhale.
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Leaded solder has been pretty much banned in Europe, at much annoyance to the electronics tinkering community.
Only the low-skill ones. Lead-free soldering actually gives you better results because it gives you harder joints. It is not hard to do either, took me a few hours to adjust and that was it.
But the lead is not dangerous for the person using it - it is only bad if it gets released out into the environment.
Untrue. You get spatter and rub-off on your hands and if you do not wash them carefully you will eat part of that. Also fumes may contain lead particles as well. Using leaded solder these days is pretty stupid.
It is the flux that causes smoke when soldering that is toxic to inhale.
That depends on the type of flux and how you work.
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Unless you have a very good ventilation system, you are breathing lead fumes when you are soldering with lead-based solder. That is harmful to the person using it.
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Actually what you liked was the smell of the pine rosin flux mixed in with it. What you should do is see if you are "neuro-diverse" (a polite way of saying you have a learning disability) such as attention deficit disorder (ADD). Especially if you find yourself forgetting things around and being absentminded, distracted. Look on youtube for channels that address adult attention deficit disorder.
There's probably countless people that spent unusually large amount of time building electronics and inhaling copi
Half you say? (Score:2)
Well that explains the last few election cycles.
Finally, the mystery is solved (Score:2)
I was mistaken. All this time I thought the problem was America's appalling primary and secondary education. I'm not involved in the system anymore, but "back in the day" we used to advise American parents to start their kids at an earlier grade level than the one they attended in a US school. For example, a Grade 6 kid coming out of the US system would usually struggle to keep up unless they moved into a Canadian Grade 4 or 5 classroom.
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That continues into university education. I have seen things taught to 2nd year CS students we did in school.
Re: Finally, the mystery is solved (Score:2)
That one is still firmly upon the educational system I think. The reality for my son's friends when they wanted to spend a year after high school in the US on a US High school was just.... full time party time. It was all so very simple.
Now, getting into MIT or Harvard, nobody managed that. But that's mainly because the US students get a much wider quota. As an example, the Australian maths and physics olympiad winner wasn't selected. In fact, if you selected the nr 1-3 physics and math students from all co
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> All this time I thought the problem was America's appalling primary and secondary education
Sort of. You'll notice a tight correlation between achievement and community wealth and it's not fair to blame the students or teachers. A main difference is that these communities cannot afford sodium fluoride so they turn to sodium silicofluoride which is very cheap because it's a waste product of fertilizer plant smokestack scrubbers and is otherwise classified as toxic waste. It's neither a viable or clini
Good thing we're not children anymore (Score:2)
.We'd be idiots from the paint and air and the lead pipes we still use. Just like the Roman Empire before it fell... ages ago. DUH. I guess It was worth it to shareholders.
A "scientific study" Indeed (Score:2)
Obviously (Score:4, Insightful)
I just assumed this is where Republicans came from.
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More likely the Democrats, as the cities are in the worst shape for lead exposure all around.
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One of many (Score:2)
Ethanol had been used before lead (Score:1)
What about ... (Score:2)
... people who were children in 2015?
Probably the most violent and neurologically damaged generation to date. In spite of lead dissapearing from the environment. Perhaps the causation/correlation has gotten lost in the data. Maybe low IQ people have a greater tendency to chew on paint.
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Most states went crazy with lead laws. I used to be very active in the real estate world. Anytime real estate is sold it has to go through the lead bullshit. I say bullshit because they're relentless. Even if you have a house certified lead free it seems to be only for a few years. Houses built decades they still want a certificate. It's a big expensive pain. I don't mind if we don't know if whatever it is contains lead paint or not. If we have a certificate I do mind.
The problem is lead is sweet. In fact t
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