Danger of solid lead?

[scr4]

I just spent an hour cleaning various metal parts, some aluminum and some lead. It didn’t occur to me to worry about lead poisoning, so I went ahead and cleaned them real well using steel wool. I didn’t wear gloves. Now that was obviously a stupid thing to do, but is it a “try not to do it again” stupid, or “you’re screwed, go to a doctor NOW” stupid?

[David_Simmons]

*Originally posted by scr4 *
**I just spent an hour cleaning various metal parts, some aluminum and some lead. It didn’t occur to me to worry about lead poisoning, so I went ahead and cleaned them real well using steel wool. I didn’t wear gloves. Now that was obviously a stupid thing to do, but is it a “try not to do it again” stupid, or “you’re screwed, go to a doctor NOW” stupid? **

I am not a doctor. I’m quite sure it is a “try not to do it again” thing. Years of exposure at the level of contamination you received are usually required in order to be damaged by lead poisoning. For example, solder in plumbing can put lead into drinking water and plumbing solder is now lead free. However millions of people lived for years in houses with lead plumbing solder without noticeable lead poisoning. The same is true of lead-based paints. Lead based paints can harmful to children because they put things in their mouth and can ingest the lead paint flakes. Several years of this, and the small size of children, can cause damage.

I wouldn’t worry, lead isn’t toxic in the same way as a spoonfull of cyanide.

[Duck_Duck_Goose]

http://www.health.state.ny.us/nysdoh/environ/exposure.htm

For example, breathing or swallowing lead can result in health effects, but touching lead is not usually harmful because lead is not absorbed particularly well through the skin.

http://www.atsdr.cdc.gov/HAC/PHA/melrose/mel_p2.html

Lead is not readily absorbed through skin. Dermal contact with lead is not known to affect the skin.

http://www.ehs.uiuc.edu/~oshs/HSGLEAD.HTM

Occupational exposure to lead usually occurs through inhalation or ingestion, lead is not usually absorbed through the skin.

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Dermal (skin) absorption
The ability of the skin to absorb certain organic lead compounds, such as tetraethyl lead found in petrol has been recognized since the 1940s. Recent laboratory research suggests inorganic lead compounds (e.g. lead nitrate, lead acetate and lead oxide) can be absorbed through the skin but in very small quantities.

'kay? This is not you. You were handling big chunks of elemental lead, not lead compounds, and your skin doesn’t absorb elemental lead very well. Rest easy.

If handling lead really did make you sick, the EPA would be all over the bass fishing industry.

[Why_A_Duck]

*Originally posted by Duck Duck Goose *
**If handling lead really did make you sick, the EPA would be all over the bass fishing industry. **

In a related story…

We spend a week every summer up at Squam Lake in New Hampshire. They have a ban in place against using lead sinkers.

Squam is a big nesting ground for the common loon, and loons have this habit of eating gravel off the lake bottom to help them grind up their food. Swallowing lead sinkers led to a big dropoff in the loon population (due to lead poisoning) which is now starting to rebound.

[scr4]

Thanks guys. I was worried about steel wool creating both tiny cuts in my skin as well as tiny lead particles, but I’m going to assume that cuts too small to see are not deep enough to be dangerous.

[easy_e]

In high school and college chemistry courses, we regularly handled lead plates with our bare hands. We were just told to wash our hands before we left, and definately before eating anything. So you’re probably okay.

[bbeaty]

*Originally posted by scr4 *
**Thanks guys. I was worried about steel wool creating both tiny cuts in my skin as well as tiny lead particles, but I’m going to assume that cuts too small to see are not deep enough to be dangerous. **

A few years back there was an article about a local machinist who was diagnosed with lead poisoning. His family had it too. For years he had been using a lead hammer, but rather than discarding it as he was supposed to, he had been fixing the edges with a grinding wheel. (If you use a lead hammer for long enough, the ends start to “mushroom”.) The lead powder in his clothing got into the family’s clothing through the wash. That’s all the news article said, but I’d imagine that the lead powder would oxidize, then the extremely fine oxide flakes would get into everything, be inhaled, etc.

If you’re paranoid you might want to discard everything that could have some lead powder in it. Scrub the floor thoroughly, etc. Could be worse. Could be cadmium.