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I guess so. My impression from reading media reportage of the incident was always that due to problems in the water supply the residents of Flint had lead in th

I guess so. My impression from reading media reportage of the incident was always that due to problems in the water supply the residents of Flint had lead in their water such that they were even more in danger than Americans generally were prior to the point in the 70's when we even realized that it was a problem. But assuming the numbers here are being presented in a way that accurately captures the situation, that is not the case and in fact even those "in crisis" today are only imbibing levels that while too high are not even as high as Americans were getting on with at all time prior to the 70's.

wpietri 8y ago
I am befuddled at this line of argument. We dropped safe levels for a reason. And reasonable people argue that our current standard is still to generous, and that it should be low or zero. That people at some point in the past had it worse does not mean it's ok that it happens today. When my dad was born, infant mortality in the US was 4x what it is now. But that doesn't mean that having 4x as many babies die is ok. Especially when the cause is an undemocratic "emergency manager" trying to save a small amount of money.
- tedunangst 8y ago
  Lowering regulated safe levels doesn't make equivalent levels more toxic, however. It's just as bad, but no worse, as it ever was.
- rmason 8y ago
  I live in Michigan about 45 minutes West of Flint. A lot of the blame rests with the emergency manager's decisions and it should be. However most of the other emergency manager appointments were successful. We wouldn't be seeing Detroit's comeback without the work of an emergency manager. A second emergency manager cut millions of dollars of waste from the budget of Detroit Public Schools and then his work led to the successful prosecution of principals and administrators who were stealing millions of dollars more. In Flint's case both the state health department and the EPA had they acted much sooner could have minimized the damage. The health department administrators are facing jail time for their crimes. Administrators of the Flint water department are also facing jail time. The EPA staffers so far have escaped any punishments whatsoever.
  - wpietri 8y ago
    I'm not seeing how any of the emergency-manager bit is relevant to what I said. It's indisputably undemocratic. Some of them surely did some good things, but that's true about dictators as well.
- savanaly 8y ago
  It's not that I'm not worried in the sense that if I had infinite resources I wouldn't allocate any to improving this particular situation. It's just that previous news coverage made it out like this was a huge crisis when in fact if it is then the greater crime it that we're ignoring several other crises that are even larger (the other cities mentioned where levels are even higher).
freehunter 8y ago
The problem is we fixed the lead problem in the 70s. It's not the 70s anymore. Making that argument is like saying "people used to get polio all the time in the 20s, why are you worried about an increase in polio now"? Because it's polio, not a free puppy. Any amount of polio is too much polio.

wpietri 8y ago

I am befuddled at this line of argument. We dropped safe levels for a reason. And reasonable people argue that our current standard is still to generous, and that it should be low or zero. That people at some point in the past had it worse does not mean it's ok that it happens today. When my dad was born, infant mortality in the US was 4x what it is now. But that doesn't mean that having 4x as many babies die is ok. Especially when the cause is an undemocratic "emergency manager" trying to save a small amount of money.

tedunangst 8y ago
Lowering regulated safe levels doesn't make equivalent levels more toxic, however. It's just as bad, but no worse, as it ever was.
rmason 8y ago
I live in Michigan about 45 minutes West of Flint. A lot of the blame rests with the emergency manager's decisions and it should be. However most of the other emergency manager appointments were successful. We wouldn't be seeing Detroit's comeback without the work of an emergency manager. A second emergency manager cut millions of dollars of waste from the budget of Detroit Public Schools and then his work led to the successful prosecution of principals and administrators who were stealing millions of dollars more. In Flint's case both the state health department and the EPA had they acted much sooner could have minimized the damage. The health department administrators are facing jail time for their crimes. Administrators of the Flint water department are also facing jail time. The EPA staffers so far have escaped any punishments whatsoever.
- wpietri 8y ago
  I'm not seeing how any of the emergency-manager bit is relevant to what I said. It's indisputably undemocratic. Some of them surely did some good things, but that's true about dictators as well.
savanaly 8y ago
It's not that I'm not worried in the sense that if I had infinite resources I wouldn't allocate any to improving this particular situation. It's just that previous news coverage made it out like this was a huge crisis when in fact if it is then the greater crime it that we're ignoring several other crises that are even larger (the other cities mentioned where levels are even higher).

freehunter 8y ago

The problem is we fixed the lead problem in the 70s. It's not the 70s anymore. Making that argument is like saying "people used to get polio all the time in the 20s, why are you worried about an increase in polio now"? Because it's polio, not a free puppy. Any amount of polio is too much polio.